Fic: What Livin' is For, Losers/Leverage, Eliot/Cougar/Jensen

[ladyjanelly]

Title: What Livin’ is For
Author: ladyjanelly 
Artist:entwashian 
Beta:peaceful_sands 
Fandoms: Leverage/Losers
Characters/pairing: Jensen/Cougar/Eliot
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Violence, language, attempted non-con, vague mentions of previous non-con
Title from a Dwight Yoakam song "Waterfall"
Summary: A one-night-stand becomes a whole lot more. If only life were that simple.

Art and soundtrack:    ( Banner + Fanmix )




Fic: 





They pick him up in a bar, which Eliot thinks has to be the most mundane possible way for guys like them to meet a guy like him.

It’s just after seven on a weekday, in a place that’s more “bar” than “gay,” working-class guys hanging out and having a beer, and if they happen to be looking for other working-class guys to head home with (assuming they didn’t come in with one), it’s low-key and never flashy. The joint is all dark wood and pitted brass, sports on the TVs over the bar and not a single piece of glitter or strobe light to be found.

Then they walk in and Eliot clocks them as trouble at first glance. The way they move, he IDs them as US Army, Special Forces. Enough of this-and-that to their walks that he thinks it’s been a while since they wore dog-tags. The kind of guys who should be above going out and starting fights, but aren’t always.

The one that’s Eliot’s height has shoulder-length dark hair and a hat that hides his eyes and the tall blond is the flashiest thing in the room, John Lennon glasses and a short goatee, neon pink shirt stretched tight over arms and chest and abs of dense muscle. They move as a team, staggered and covering separate sections of the room. The cowboy orders their drinks at the bar, pays cash, while the blond watches his back and then they find a table, lounging with false ease as they scope the room.

Eliot watches them in the mirror but he can’t catch what they’re saying. The normally friendly crowd gives them a wide berth. Nobody jostles their table or comes over to say hi.

“Him? Seriously?” The blond’s voice raises with surprise and Eliot frowns over to see who he’s going to have to defend, because he’ll be damned if he lets some bastards get their kicks rolling faggots in his bar.

Blondie’s eyes meet Eliot’s through the lenses of his stupid glasses and they just stare at each other. Then he licks his lips and murmurs something to the Cowboy, but all Eliot can catch is the “I swear to God, if he kills me,” and then the man’s standing, downing a shot for courage and heading Eliot’s way.

As he approaches, Eliot runs through his opponent’s most likely openings, his own blocks and counter-strikes. He inventories six different possible improvised weapons, figures where he’s going to drop the body and when he’ll have to be ready for the Cowboy to join in.

Still out of strike range, the blond stuffs his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. He rocks forward on his toes, feet too close together to kick effectively, off-balance, intentionally so. Not an attack then. Eliot is intrigued.

“Hey,” Blondie says, “So uh, you come here often?”

Eliot waits and the man rocks up to his toes again, nervous smile plastered on his face.

“So I like your hair,” the man offers. He makes a vague gesture at Eliot’s head. “It’s real… long?”

Eliot gives him the “Get to the damn point” glare.

“Strong and silent, I get it, I can work with that, believe me.” He takes a deep breath. “So I’m Jake, and over there, that’s Cougar.”

Eliot looks over and Cougar tips his hat, lips quirking in a wicked smirk.

“So we had a bet,” Jake explains, and here it is, some tough-guy dare they’ve got going on and Eliot’s only glad it’s him they’ve decided to target and not someone who’d take the fucking-with a little more personally.

“The winner gets to choose who and the loser has to do the pick-up. And man, this goes so much better when I win the bets. I mean not that you’re a bad choice. I mean you’re not. I might have chosen you. Probably would have chosen you. I just mean that guy?” he gestures back at Cougar, “Is so much smoother than I am and if he was the one here asking you to have sex with us you’d already be saying yes instead of making the Oh-god-stop-talking face.”

Eliot looks back over at the Cowboy and Cougar is already sliding out of his chair, strong and graceful. Head tipping back as he finishes his drink, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows.

“Come with us,” Jake implores, “It’ll be epic, swear to god, he does this thing with his tongue and it’s just—”

Cougar is there by then, and he pulls Jake down for a kiss that’s equal parts fierce and loving.

“Too much talking,” Cougar complains as they part. He turns to Eliot, the look in his eyes seductive and challenging. “Come with us,” he says, his words a softly accented echo of Jake’s. “Be with us. One night.”

It’s not safe, it’s not right. Eliot knows that saying yes to a couple of mercenaries is the least-safe type of sex there is. But Jake’s smile is so damn hopeful, and Cougar’s gaze respectful as much as it is arousing.

They should feel like the bait in a very attractive trap, but they don’t.

It’s dangerous, but there’s fire and steel in a soldier’s touch that Eliot’s been missing for a long time.

“Yeah,” he says, “Okay.” Jake leans in, a brush of lips and flick of tongue over Eliot’s mouth like a promise.

“We can use my place,” Eliot says, because he knows where the exits are, where he’s got weapons hidden. Worst case scenario he has to burn the safe-house when he’s done, leave and never come back. There’s nothing there he can’t replace though, and better than letting them choose the venue, have him outnumbered and on their turf.

“Sure,” Jake says and Cougar nods and they step out into the night, walk together the few blocks down to the brownstone where Eliot lives now.

He should feel herded by them flanking him as they walk, but they’re smoother than that. Making him the head of their wedge, stepping in clean almost behind him as they cut through a knot of pedestrians, spreading out again when there’s room. More like bodyguards than anything. Sharp and competent. They walk with him up the flights of stairs to his door. Cougar turns there, leaning with his back to the wall. As Eliot slots his key to the lock Jake slides behind him, hands circling his waist, rubbing low on his stomach, fingers dipping just below the waistband of his jeans.

“Jesus,” he grumbles, “You know I have neighbors, right?”

“Hall’s clear,” Cougar says, smug and sure.

“Besides,” Jake adds, low and sexy in Eliot’s ear, “The sounds we’re going to get out of you, they’re gonna know how good you’re getting fucked.”

Cougar huffs in amusement and Jake scoffs. “What? That was sexy. I can do sexy.”

Eliot gets the lock open and turns the knob, grabbing Jake’s shirt to drag him in. “You try too damn hard,” he says, but the blunt critique doesn’t seem to dim anyone’s ardor much. Jake’s grinning like he won the lottery and Cougar’s closing in on Eliot’s other side.

“Hey,” Eliot says, before it gets too far. He turns a little, angling so only one of them will have a clear shot at him if they object. “I don’t like guns in my place. You can leave ‘em on the side table there.”

Cougar quirks a wry smile and reaches under the back of his un-tucked shirt, pulls a revolver out of a waistband holster there. He pops the cylinder and drops the bullets into his other hand, leaves it open and empty on the table, ammo beside it.

“I left mine in the car,” Jake says with a grin and a shrug.

Cougar’s jaw clenches and a shadow passes over his expression. Eliot doesn’t know the guy, but for a second he expects an explosion of violence.

“You deserve to have your dick shot off,” Cougar growls, accent thick with anger, and Jake looks repentant.

“Nobody’s shooting my dick off here,” he says like it’s supposed to be soothing. He looks to Eliot as if to confirm that Eliot isn’t planning to emasculate him. “I’d just be leaving it on his table with yours. Right?

“Speaking of our sexy host,” Jake murmurs, when Cougar looks like he might be deal-breaker pissed, “I promised him that thing you do with your tongue. You know? The thing?”

“Your boy makin’ promises your mouth can’t keep?” Eliot asks, low and just this side of teasing.

Then Cougar’s on him, one hand in his hair and the other at his hip, mouths slotting together as they kiss, setting the pace intense but slow, plundering Eliot’s mouth, coaxing him to open up, to meet him half-way. Even with his eyes open, Eliot doesn’t even realize he’s been walked backward until the wall’s at his back and Cougar’s thigh is sliding between his.

“Oh my fucking God,” Jake breathes, “That’s gotta be the hottest thing since Lara Croft.” And he starts stripping his shirt off over his head there in Eliot’s entry way, kicking his shoes off in random directions, wriggling out of his pants.

“What do you want?” Cougar asks, low and slow, a sharp contrast to Jake’s rush. “How do you want us?”

Eliot kind of expected them to take charge, outnumbering him and all. The wealth of options is sort of overwhelming. “His dick,” he says, because it’s out there already, huge and hot and ready. “Your mouth,” he says to Cougar, because if he sucks like he kisses, Jake wasn’t exaggerating about the epic-ness.

“You have a bed?” Cougar asks as Jake’s hands pop Eliot’s belt buckle open and start work on his fly. He half-nods in the right direction and they stumble that way together, pieces of Eliot’s clothing and then Cougar’s finding their way to the floor.

“Lube?” Jake asks as they get to the bedroom and onto the bed. “Condoms?” Eliot points and then Cougar’s on him, the point of his tongue making tiny circles around Eliot’s left nipple, the soft prickle of his mustache adding another layer to the sensation.

They move in tandem—Cougar rolls him to his side and slides his knee up as Jake’s slick fingers rub lube on his hole. “Got you,” Jake soothes, and then pushes inside, one finger at first followed by two. “God, you’re so tight,” he says as he opens Eliot up, pushes a third in just a little too soon, letting him feel the stretch.

He grunts at the feeling, trying to convince his body it’s not an attack, that it’s a good hurt. Cougar slides up and kisses him again, slower, gentle. “Shhh,” he soothes, “He’s good at this.” Eliot deliberately relaxes his shoulders, breathes through his nose and tips his head back. Cougar’s kiss is soft, his tongue teasing at the scar on Eliot’s lip, his free hand massaging at the back of Eliot’s neck. Jake adds more lube and Eliot wills himself into complicity, tries not to tense up again as Jake slides into him from behind in one slow push.

“Fuck,” Eliot groans, because Jesus, that dick’s every bit as big as it looked. Jake rocks into him twice, slow and steady, and then he wraps his top arm around Eliot’s waist and rolls them so Eliot’s on top, face up. Jake’s legs push between Eliot’s, spreading him out and opening him up. God, it’s almost too much, too deep, Jake’s hands dancing over his exposed chest and stomach and dick.

And then Cougar is there, kneeling between Eliot’s spread knees, ducking in and breathing over his balls, tongue flicking out to where the skin of Eliot’s asshole is stretched tight around Jake’s dick. He licks and nips and teases, pushes his tongue like he’s going to slip it in beside Jake’s dick.

“We’ve got you,” Jake murmurs again, and Eliot realizes he’s been panting, swearing, fucking moaning at the intensity of it all, at Jake’s slicked-up hand on his dick and Cougar’s mouth on his balls. At the pressure on his prostate from the inside and from Cougar’s thumb on his perineum.

He gasps and groans and Jake thrusts into him, hands on his hips man-handling him into the power of his pushes. And fuck, it’s the most intense thing he’s known, giving it up to them, letting them have him in so many ways at once.

“God, so fucking beautiful,” Jake says like he means it, fucks like he means it and Eliot’s coming, hot spurts of come spattering his stomach and chest, all the way up to his chin. Jake right behind him, groaning into his neck and burying himself deep.

Cougar’s strong hands smear the come over Eliot’s belly as Jake and Eliot pant for breath, his eyes dark and hungry. He leans in and flicks the point of his tongue into the slit of Eliot’s dick, collecting the last taste of his come. Eliot twitches with aftershocks, and Cougar looks up as his lips close over Eliot, fucking him with the intensity of his gaze. Jake’s hands wander gently over Eliot’s chest, his sides, lips kissing and sucking at Eliot’s neck. Dick still in Eliot’s ass, although he’s soft now.

Cougar’s mouth closes around the head of Eliot’s dick, slow and gentle, coaxing it to rise again. “Yeah,” Jake whispers behind him. Fingers skim his nipples.

Cougar pulls back, until the very tip of Eliot’s cock rests on his lower lip. “Can I fuck you?” he asks and Eliot’s spent but willing and he nods. He expects to be rolled over, but Jake just hooks his hands under Eliot’s knees and lifts him off of his dick, pulls Eliot’s knees up and opens him up for Cougar to slide on in. He’s sore, can’t help but hiss as Cougar pushes into him, the cool-slick of the condom. It’s some kind of kinky-good to be used like this, Jake holding him as he’s fucked hard.

He wraps his hand around his own dick, feels the second orgasm building in his balls, breaking free. Cougar makes one last thrust, pushing deep and holding himself there and then he half-collapses on them, holding part of his weight up on his arms, head bowed and hairs that have worked their way loose from his ponytail tickling at Eliot’s face.

“Oh Jesus,” Jake groans from the bottom of their pile, “As sexy as this all is, you fuckers are crushing me here.”

Cougar huffs and pushes himself up and off, crawls to the edge of the bed. Jake rolls Eliot to the same side, into the space Cougar’s left for him. Warm hands rub over his arm, his hip. Cougar leans in and kisses him one last time, soft and chaste.

“Washcloth?” Jake asks and Eliot waves him towards the bathroom, knowing they aren’t all that hard to find once you’re in the right room. He listens to Jake fumble around. Watches Cougar’s eyes close, his eye lashes short and dark and curled.

“Here,” Jake says and passes Eliot a wet washcloth. He uses the one in his other hand to clean up Cougar, who murmurs sleepily and tries to squirm away from the damp.

Eliot wipes down his chest and then gets his back-side. Checks the cloth but there’s no blood.

“Hey,” Jake says, “I’m gonna go try to find my clothes, that okay with you?” Telling Eliot that he’s going into the room with the gun before he does it, and Eliot appreciates it.

“Yeah,” he says, figuring that leaving a sleepy Cougar behind is enough of a show of good faith.

Jake goes out and wanders back in a few minutes later, underwear on over that fine ass but nothing else.

Cougar snorts and rolls over, back to them both.

Jake grins, so much affection in his smile that Eliot aches to see it. “So he’s down for the count.” Jake crawls back into bed on Eliot’s other side. “Whenever you’re done with having us here, just let me know and we’ll get out of your way.” Despite his words of leaving, he settles down and runs his fingers through Eliot’s hair.

“Hey,” Jake whispers, glancing at Cougar to see if he’s still asleep. “Can you keep a secret?”

And what kind of fucking idiot would tell secrets to a one-night-stand anyway. But Jake seems to take Eliot’s lack of reply for a promise of secrecy and continues on.

“He thinks I’ve got a kink for hair. That’s why he picked you. Long hair for me, blue eyes for him.”

Eliot’s stomach jumps with unexpected laughter, because it’s just too ridiculous.

“Dumb-ass,” he mutters and he should get up. Go look at those blue-prints Hardison printed out for him. Read a book on the couch. Something other than lay here between these dangerous men and cuddle.

In a minute, he thinks. Any minute now.

=============



Eliot doesn’t sleep. Not in a bed with two men he doesn’t know. He sort of lets himself zone though, watching as the dull glow of the streetlights warms and brightens as the sun starts to come up. Eventually he pries himself out from under Jake’s arm and Cougar’s thigh and climbs off of the foot of the bed. He’s heading for the shower when Jake stops him with a soft word.

“Want company?” Jake suggests and Eliot chuckles. Cougar’s eyes are open, dark and mysterious.

“Tempting as the offer is, I think you guys wore me out.” In the cold light of day, this seems even less-smart than it did the night before.

“Hey, you could fuck me instead, if you wanted to,” Jake offers. “I’m an equal-opportunity fuck-buddy.”

Eliot considers it but shakes his head. “My dick’s raw and my balls ache from how hard I came last night. I appreciate it, maybe next time.” The words are out of his mouth before he can stop them, and he wants to kick himself. God-damn sleep deprivation. He’s getting old and soft, saying the first thing to come to mind.

Jake shrugs. “Yeah, maybe.”

“Stick around,” Eliot offers, because, besides the unavoidable ache in his backside, they were pretty damn considerate and it seems rude to kick them out. “Let me grab a shower and I’ll make you breakfast.”

He goes into the bathroom before they’ve said yes or no, lathers up and washes down in record time and pulls on a pair of sweats.

“I didn’t break him, you broke him,” Jake is hissing at Cougar when Eliot comes out.

“I ain’t broke, just fucked-out,” Eliot objects and herds them out to the kitchen. Cougar slides into one of the kitchen chairs and Jake stands behind him, finger-combing his hair back from his face. It’s intimate, even more than watching their kisses and he opens the fridge and pokes around as an excuse to look away.

“Feta and spinach omelets?” he offers and smirks at their surprise. Apparently whatever type of hitter/merc/thug these guys are doesn’t eat any better than the hacker and thief he’s more familiar with.

Eliot pulls out the ingredients and Jake draws Cougar’s hair back, ties it with a black elastic. Eliot heats the pan and whips the eggs and Jake keeps trying to wander off, to go exploring and Cougar keeps bringing him back with the force of his glare. Jake looks longingly at the laptop Hardison insisted Eliot have and Cougar gives him a firm “No.”

They eat when Eliot serves their plates, Jake’s moans of appreciation damn near obscene and Cougar’s “Gracias” heartfelt enough that it feels square. That they gave him the fucking of his year and he gave them some pretty good sex and breakfast after.

“Thanks,” Jake says as they’re standing to leave, stepping forward to kiss Eliot one last time, casual and sweet.

“Next time,” Cougar says, leaning in for a kiss of his own, a god-damn work of art of lips and tongue and Jake rolls his eyes behind Cougar’s back at being so deliberately shown up.

They both grin and Jake waves and Cougar collects his weapon on the way out the door. Eliot takes a slow breath in the sudden quiet of his home and then picks up his phone to make a call.

“Hardison? I need you to check out a couple guys for me…”

============


“Holy shit,” Jensen breathes and the tap-tapping at his laptop stops. Cougar looks up from where he’s field-stripping his rifle.

“Eliot,” Jensen continues, “Last-night Eliot? We fucked Eliot mother-fucking Spencer. C’mere, you’ve gotta see this; this is him, right?”

Cougar snorts and shakes his head. “You didn’t know?”

======

"Anything you noticed,” Hardison says as he types, “Anything at all.”

“Cougar,” Eliot starts, “Five-foot-ten, one-seventy maybe. Hispanic, dark hair and eyes.” He thinks of the faint sweet smell of banana bread on the man’s hands, figures it for Hoppe’s gun cleaner. He remembers the carbon residue down deep into the creases of Cougar’s fingerprints, the six-shot revolver on Eliot’s entryway table, a back-up piece at best. “Gun guy but not short range. Sniper, probably.”

Hardison taps at the keyboard a bit. Makes a non-committal noise.

“The other said his name was Jake. Six foot even, probably one-ninety. Blond hair, blue eyes. Muscular. Tattoo on his left bicep, a steer of some sort, horns down. Both of them three, maybe four years out of the US Army. Jake’s no shooter though. Not attached to his gun. Demolitions, maybe?”

“Tech?” Hardison offers and Eliot remembers the way Jake looked at his laptop, like a few hours off of the computer had been too long.

“Yeah, could be.”

Hardison whistles low and long. “And you say these guys tried to pick you up in a bar?”

“That’s what I said, Hardison,” Eliot grumps, doesn’t add that they’d been successful. “So who the hell are they?”

“It’s not so much who they are as what they are,” Hardison says and Eliot holds back from smacking the back of his head. “What you’ve got is a pair of ghosts.” He turns the screen around and Eliot’s looking at Jake and Cougar’s faces, the word “Deceased” across each one.

“Army reported them dead four years ago. That thing in Bolivia? Looks like it was them.”

Eliot shrugs. He’d been busy in Syria around that time. He remembers something about a helicopter full of kids, remembers thinking it didn’t add up. Having met Jake and Cougar though, it makes even less sense. Not that he thinks fucking is the window to the soul or anything, but he doesn’t figure either of them for the kind of guy who could do something like that.

He gives the file one more glance-over, noting the faces of the other men who supposedly died in the same crash. Doesn’t matter though, he thinks. It was a fun fuck but he’s not likely to run into them again, unless picking him up really was part of a job for them and he’s the target.

Hardison goes into a flurry of typing then. “This Jensen dude was J-mageddon. The guy’s a legend among hackers. People like him don’t just stop working because they faked their death. He’s got to be still active, just using a different signature, a different set of cracks, like trading in his Ocean deck for a Fire one. But the play. Maybe I can find him by the way he plays the hand…”

Eliot leaves him to it, feeling just a little disappointed that these two are too dangerous to open himself to again.

==============



Jensen has never been great with down-time. Since the first time Cougar met him, he’s been able to deal with any kind of pressure, any deadline. Three days between finalizing their next job (data extraction, Jensen on the ground, Cougar covering him if he runs into trouble) and actually getting on a plane is driving him batty. Cougar doesn’t need a scope to see it, how the man is all fidgets and restless energy, interspersed with these weird moments of staring into space. What the tech needs is a distraction, he decides, something more complex than Cougar can provide on his own.

It’s no big thing to get Jensen worked up, to throw out a challenge he knows the man will take and to make a bet that Cougar expects to lose.

“Your choice then,” Cougar sighs with mock-sorrow, and they head to a bar, not too bright or loud, and sit for two fucking hours while Jensen tries to make up his mind.

“That one maybe?” Jensen says at last, pointing over to a lumberjack in red plaid standing by the jukebox. Cougar rolls his eyes at the lack of enthusiasm.

“What do you really want tonight?” he asks, because at this rate they’ll be out of time before Jensen decides.

Jensen looks uncertain at the question, and in all the years they’ve been doing this, taking strangers to their bed for one-night stands, there’s never been anything Jensen has been afraid or ashamed of asking for. Men, women, butch, femme. From clean-cut to punked-out pierced and tattooed, from vanilla to a little kinky. His tastes run much wider than Cougar’s, but Cougar has always been okay with it, when it was Jensen’s turn. He can’t fathom what could suddenly be the problem.

“Remember Boston?” Jensen asks, and Cougar’s guts twist in a strange combination of trepidation and arousal. Arousal because it had been a particularly satisfying experience. Trepidation because this is the first time either of them has wanted the same person a second time. It scares him, that Jensen would want Eliot again. That he wants Eliot again.

“Hey,” Jensen’s voice draws his attention back to the here and now. “I’m just saying it was nice, right? Having him watching over us while you got some sleep. And that breakfast. He was just nice.”

“Si,” Cougar agrees, and despite his worry that this will be the one who messes them up somehow, he too remembers the night with inordinate fondness. He runs the numbers in his head. “Two hours to Boston, two hours with Eliot, two hours back. We’d still make our flight.”

“Yeah?” Jake asks, hopeful but guarded. “You’re sure?”

===============

He gets back from Croatia at three in the morning. Nate lets them scatter from the airport, with orders to be at the headquarters around noon for a debriefing and to talk about prospective cases. He’s home for less than an hour when there’s a tap at the door and his body goes on high alert, tense and ready.

He goes to the door, keeping his center-mass behind the reinforced panel set in the door as he looks out of the peep-hole.

Jake Jensen is on the other side, grinning goofy and hopeful, a shadow that has to be Cougar behind his shoulder.

“Hey Eliot?” he calls through the door, “So that next-time you were talking about last time, we were wondering if you were in the mood for it now.” Like a vague suggestion made months ago was a date and a promise.

Eliot knows he should go. Slip out the back and disappear. He never gave them his name, and there’s no reason getting his dick wet is worth risking his life.

“Hey,” Jake’s voice is softer now and he has to lean in to hear it through the door. “Don’t be like this, baby.” Teasing, sweet. “If we wanted to hurt you Cougar would have popped your head off from half a mile away. It’s okay. We’re here to be with you. Nothing else. Been thinking about you. All the sexy things we could do together.”

His voice stops for a second, comes back half-indignant. “It does not automatically make it un-sexy to use the word sexy in a description. No, I’m not talking too much; the door is closed. If he wants a word in edgewise he’ll have to open it and then you can do that thing with your eyes and we can talk if he wants to, and then everyone gets laid.”

He shouldn’t. It goes against every bit of logic and sense. But his heart tells him the only risk is that he’ll forget this is just sex. That they have each other and he has his team and this can never be more than fucking. He flips the dead-bolt and turns the knob. Opens the door.

Cougar already has his gun out, cylinder popped and offered butt-first into Eliot’s hand. He takes it and goes to put it on the table but Jake’s on him, hands like an octopus, everywhere at once.

“So do we have to have some sort of a talk?” Jake asks, and then licks up the side of Eliot’s neck. “Or can we just get to the fucking? ‘Cause that part’s a lot more fun.”

Cougar comes up to them then, covers Jake’s hands and stills them where they grope at Eliot’s body.

“Eliot,” he says, dark eyes serious, “We won’t sell you out. You don’t sell us out. Deal?” In all Jake’s noise, one thing he’d said was true. A man like Cougar? If he wanted Eliot dead, he’d never see it coming, and there are enough “dead or alive” contracts out on Eliot to make it worth his while. At this point Eliot would have to either kill them both or leave the Leverage team, change states, maybe even find a new country to live in if he wants to make it so Cougar can’t kill him. Or he can trust that they mean him no harm.

And there’s a certain amount of relief. That he doesn’t have to pretend with them. They know who he is, and more important what. There’ll be no ugly surprises later, no need for lies in the meantime.

“Yeah,” he says, “It’s a deal.”

“Fantastic!” Jake says with a grin. “So you’ll fuck me now?”

Eliot glances to Cougar, double-checking for jealousy, but all he sees is smoldering lust in the man’s eyes. What the hell; he’d slept on the plane. What’s another hour or so before he gets to crash?

“Bedroom,” Eliot says and waves them down the hall. Jake leads the way, dropping clothing as he goes, carefree and unselfconscious. He looks over his shoulder as he struggles to get his pants off over his boots. Blue eyes meeting Eliot’s like he’s not just a convenient fuck. Smiling like this means something good.

Jake is naked by the time they get to the bed, crawling up on Eliot’s covers and sprawling on his back, hand stroking his dick as he watches Eliot and Cougar stripping out of their clothes, ridiculous glasses still perched on his face.

Cougar takes off his hat and tosses it onto the dresser, his eyes on Jake like he’s going to eat him alive. He strips down, and Eliot watches as he kisses Jake, slow and sensual and then light and teasing, fingers running through the short spikes of Jake’s hair. Jake stops touching himself in favor of touching Cougar, his lips, his hair, his neck. Eliot rubs his palm over his own hard cock, and he thinks sometime he’d like to just watch them, let them put on a show for him while he sits in a chair and strokes himself.

Another time, he thinks. If there is another time.

He slides his clothes off and climbs on the bed with them, up against Jake’s other side, adding his own kisses and petting to those Cougar is giving the man. He watches Cougar’s hand slide down Jake’s stomach, shying away from his dick at the last minute, short nails scratching at his skin, at the wiry hair of his pubes. Jake twitches and moans and Cougar denies him the touch he’s so clearly desperate for. Eliot joins in the tease, fingers following the sharp cut of Jake’s hip, the line of muscle down into his groin, licking and kissing at his neck while he does.

Jake’s hand moves to stroke himself and Eliot’s fingers close around his wrist. Not a grip that Jake couldn’t break, but a request. Let us do this for you, Eliot’s touch says, Let us tease you to the limits of what you can take. And Jake’s hand goes up into Eliot’s hair, drawing him down into a kiss that bruises, the sharp nip of his teeth on Eliot’s lips.

“If somebody doesn’t fuck me soon,” Jake warns and Cougar huffs out a laugh.

“Careful what you ask for,” Cougar warns, and scoots closer to the headboard. Jake rolls over, eyes on Cougar’s dick, his ass in the air. Eliot watches as Jake slides his hand down Cougar’s shaft, drawing back the foreskin, caressing the head of his cock with his lips, the tip of his tongue. And as beautiful as the sight is, his own arousal is throbbing with need. He reaches into the bedside table and gets out lube and condoms, slides in behind Jake. The first brush of Eliot’s fingers makes him jump, the second makes him moan.

“Oh, shit,” Jake groans as Eliot scissors him open, just this side of too-fast, “He’s gonna fuck me, Cougs. Are you watching this?”

Eliot looks up and Cougar is definitely interested, his hips twitching up against Jake’s lips in time to Eliot’s finger-fucking. Eliot lines himself up and Jake draws in a breath. He grabs Jake by his hips, pushes in and Jake opens his mouth over Cougar, takes him in, lets Eliot drive him forward and down until his lips are as far down as he could go. Slowly back, Cougar’s hands in Jake’s hair to keep him from coming all the way off, and then Eliot pushes in again.

Cougar’s dark eyes meet Eliot’s blue and they find a rhythm, Jake lax between them, letting them fuck him and use him, his noisy moans of appreciation just urging them on every time Eliot thinks maybe they’re getting too rough.

Jake tries to balance himself on one hand, tries to get the other up under himself to get some sort of friction on his dick but Eliot stops him, “I’ll do it,” he says, guiding Jake’s hand back to support his upper body before he falls. He reaches under, feels Jake hot and throbbing and slick at the tip with pre-come. He wraps his hand around, squeezes and then strokes.

“Come for us,” Cougar urges and that plus Eliot’s hand is all it takes, Jake tensing and shaking, swallowing and gagging as Cougar thrusts up into his mouth one last time, clenching around Eliot’s dick and bringing him along for the ride.

Cougar is the first to pull away, shifting back and to the side a little so Jake can breathe again. Eliot rests his cheek between Jake’s shoulder-blades until he can get his breathing under control. Bounty or not, they just might kill him if they keep this up.

Cougar strokes Jake’s cheek with his fingertips, wipes sweat from his face. “What you wanted?”

“Yeah,” Jake whispers, “Perfect.” He tries to crane his neck to see behind him and Eliot rolls to the side, grabs the base of the condom and pulls out with a hiss.

“Was it as good for you as it was for me?” Jake asks and Eliot surprises himself with a laugh.

“No, I just come like a freight train for mediocre sex,” he mutters, and he feels so heavy. Tired. Cougar gets up this time and gets the cleaning supplies, slips the condom off of Eliot’s softening dick and throws it away. Goes to gather up the trail of Jake’s clothes, tugging on Jake’s legs and helping him slide into his underwear and then jeans.

They’re leaving, Eliot realizes. He wants to tell them they don’t have to, that it’s three AM and to just crash here, but he knows he’ll sleep restless with other people in his space and Nate has plans for them in the morning.

“Hey,” Cougar says as he kisses Eliot one last time. “Come lock up after us?” Eliot drags himself out of bed, slipping into the bathrobe that Cougar holds out for him.

Jake kisses him at the door, slides his fingers through Eliot’s sweat-sticky hair.

“I won the bet this time,” Jake says with a soft smile, “Cougar totally should have been the one trying to talk our way in here.”

Then they’re gone and Eliot locks the door, the apartment feeling empty and quiet with them gone.

================

They’re six days into the con, their target a mobster turned movie producer, dirty up to his eyeballs. Sophie is playing the British investor, all posh charm and confidence. Eliot goes in as her body-guard, not a grift at all besides the name he’s using. He’s there to make her look important, to add perceived value to their end of the negotiations.

Rubino wants to meet at his offices, the penthouse suite in a six-story building of glass and aluminum, glittering in the California sun. Eliot shadows Sophie’s steps, unobtrusive, hand up to his conspicuous ear-piece as Nate and Hardison give him information from the earbud below it. They step out of the elevator on the top floor and Rubino’s own security man opens the door to the office for them.

“Ms. Ellsworth,” Rubino says with a predatory grin, “So nice of you to come to our humble studio,” and he stands to greet her. The man makes Eliot’s skin crawl, his fake cheer and dead eyes, but he stands at his post by the door, prepares to watch Rubino hug Sophie. Of course Rubino is going to cop a feel. Eliot will follow her lead, take outrage if she does, blow it off if that’s the play.

Rubino smirks, arms open for that hug, eyes meeting Eliot’s over Sophie’s shoulder in some stupid sort of challenge. Then Rubino’s head explodes into red mist, just gone. The spatter of it covers Sophie’s front, her face, her arms. No fucking sound at all, just the tap of the bullet going through the window, the shooter half a mile away at least and Eliot moves, grabbing Sophie, covering her with his body (not that it’ll do any good with that caliber of weapon). She’s silent as he runs for the door with her, past Rubino’s slack-jawed gorilla.

The reception room is safer, not that the walls are much protection, but the windows face a different direction so at least the sniper doesn’t have line-of-sight.

“Oh,” says Sophie, and Eliot takes a second to wipe at the blood, looking for wounds, for flying splinters of bone or teeth to have hurt her but he doesn’t see anything.

“What the hell just happened?” Nate demands, too-loud on the ear-buds.

“Sniper!” Eliot calls back. “Rubino’s down!” An alarm starts screaming and Rubino’s muscle are going to be locking down exits. He hustles Sophie for the stairs, good strong fire-walls and the only threats within are the security guards coming up. Eliot jumps down to meet them, closes in too tight for them to use their guns and like most people they forget what else they could do, struggling to get the barrel pointed at him instead of hitting him with a fist. It’s over in seconds and he has to go back for Sophie, still staring at her shaking hands.

They get down and to the back entrance. Nate speeds up in a car and there’s only twenty yards or so of open ground to cover.

Then a security guy appears from around the far corner of the building, pistol drawn. Eliot turns he and Sophie as he runs, covering her with his body. He expects the crack of the pistol but the sound he hears is more of a thwack and when he looks over, the guard is going down, a hole the size of a fist in his chest.

Nate flings open the door and Eliot shoves Sophie inside, pushing her over and getting in himself. “Go, go!” he says and Nate hits the gas.

They drive but nobody follows them, no bullets pierce the car. Eliot breathes out a sigh only when they’re a full mile away from the office building.

“He…” Sophie stutters from the passenger seat, “He…his head…”

Eliot rubs her back while Nate drives. “Large caliber bullet. High velocity. That was a whole lot of overkill. Somebody wanted him dead and then some.”

They park in the hotel’s garage and Eliot runs upstairs for a wet towel and change of clothes. Nate and Sophie are talking in the back seat when he gets back down, and he passes over the supplies and then stands guard while she cleans up and changes. The blood-stained clothes he bags for disposal, and then they all three go to Hardison’s room to try to figure what the hell is going on.

Parker lets them in, opening the door when they’re still four feet away. Hardison is on his computer, typing like a flurry of hail on a skylight, fast and furious.

“What? What, oh heeeell no!”

“What’s going on?” Nate wants to know.

“I’m trying to get some images of our shooter off the roof, but there wasn’t anything, and then I went back to try to scrub Eliot and Sophie off of Rubino’s security cameras and the data’s disappearing as fast as I can pull it up to delete it. We got another hacker poking around in our operation and trying to trace my location at the same time.”

And Hardison might not put the pieces together, about a hacker/sniper team Eliot mentioned once, four months ago, but Eliot’s mind can’t help going to warm nights and fiery touches, Cougar’s lips and Jake’s hands.

A three dimensional image of the surrounding city spins on one of Hardison’s screens, one building highlighted as Hardison tries to find their sniper leaving.

“Not there,” Eliot says, calculating the angle of the bullet that came through Rubino’s window, the shot that took down the guard on the ground floor. He points at a different structure. “There. It’s got the height and the trajectory is right for the two shots that I saw.”

“That’s half a mile away!” Hardison squawks, but changes his target, images flickering on his screen faster than Eliot can process them. He pauses and there’s a shadow, hat and rifle on a human shape on the screen.

And then the screen goes black.

“No,” Hardison says in disbelief, “No, no, no.”

A video of a hyena pops up, its cackling laugh filling the room. The computer begins to make a whirring noise, and Eliot pulls the cord as the smell of smoke starts to emanate from it.

“That…” Hardison stares in horror. “That shouldn’t even be possible.”

“Okay,” Nate says, “We have to figure out who we’re up against and what they want. We need a different revenue source to get the client her life savings back.”

“I need to go,” Eliot says and stands.

“What?” asks everyone else in the room at the same time.

“Give me an hour. Let me see what I can come up with.”

He goes back down the elevator, raises his face to make eye contact with every camera he passes. Walks through the poolside doors and sits down at one of the outdoor bar’s tables. The sun is bright and it isn’t long before a shadow passes over him, Jake sliding into the chair on his right, Cougar into the one across from him.

“We didn’t know,” Jake says without preamble. “I hadn’t poked into your team. I mean besides your hacker, who’s pretty good for a civilian. But I wasn’t tracking him or anything. Seriously, Eliot, we wouldn’t fuck with you like this. We didn’t mean to blow your operation.”

Cougar’s eyes are lowered, his trigger-finger idly rubbing over his lower lip. “Is your woman hurt?” he asks and Eliot thinks he actually cares what the answer is.

“Shook up,” he sighs, “She’ll be okay.”

“Here,” Jake says and slides a camera bag into Eliot’s lap. “Half our take from this job.”

There’s no reason for them to do this. No code of honor that says they owe him anything.

“Buy Har-dwire a new computer,” Jake says, and smiles regretfully. “Sorry I had to melt that sweet system, but I couldn’t let him have a picture of Cougs. I’ll do the tidying up since he’s out of commission. Your room keys will work through the weekend, but they aren’t under your aliases anymore.”

Jake looks at him, like he wants to see something else besides Eliot’s stoic wall.

“Are we cool?”

“Yeah,” Eliot sighs. “I’ll let the team know.”

He stands and puts the strap of the camera bag on his shoulder. Walks away knowing they could have put a bullet in him today if they wanted to.

The team is jabbering at each other when he comes in, closes the door behind himself and dumps the cash on the bed.

“What?” Nate asks, “Where did you get that?”

“Professional misunderstanding,” Eliot explains. He figures there’s about seventy-five grand there. He takes one of the bricks of hundreds and tosses it to Hardison.

“Don’t look for the man in the hat again,” he warns.

“Did you just beat up a pair of hit-men for their lunch money?” Hardison asks and Eliot shrugs.

“Something like that.”

There’s a lot of talking after, but the target is gone, the money from the camera bag will pay for the client’s losses and their expenses. What can they do but go home?

“And we just let these murderers go?” Sophie asks.

“How many times have we left a target with pissed-off mob bosses or drug dealers or Yakuza on their tails? You think they get a good scolding and let go? Hardison, how many of our old targets have died within the year of us hitting them?”

Hardison shrugs. “I could tell you if my computer wasn’t slag. I’d guess the percentage is pretty high.”

“So Rubino ended up dead sooner than later. We gonna go after every hit-team that ever took down a bad man now?” He looks around but nobody seems to think that’s a solid plan.

“Look,” Eliot says, “They saw their mistake. Offered restitution. They aren’t gunning for us. I see no reason to make it a problem. Are we done? I’d like to hit the gym before we fly out again.”

“Yeah, no,” says Nate, but his eyes are calculating, knowing. “By all means, go ahead. I think we’re done here.”

“Wait!” Hardison yells behind him, “Was that J-Mageddon? J-Mageddon thinks I’m a threat?” He sounds oddly star-struck by the idea.

Eliot goes back to his room, thoroughly unsurprised to find a folded piece of paper under his door, nothing on it but a room number. He thinks on it for less than a minute and then he’s leaving his room again, taking the stairs down two flights and knocking on Jake and Cougar’s door.

“You came,” says Cougar when he opens the door, a twitch of a smile playing at the corner of his mouth. He steps back to let Eliot in.

Jake sits at the room’s little table, tapping away at a laptop. “Almost done,” he calls, distracted, and Eliot’s familiar enough with post-mission hacking to not take it personally.

Cougar’s hand on his arm is warm, steady. “We good still?” and Eliot can’t think of a single reason to stay pissed. He knew what they were. He just never expected his team to bump into them by accident.

“We’re good,” he says, and Cougar takes that as permission to step into his space, to breathe his air and press their lips together, to kiss him slow and sensual. They slow-step across the room to the foot of the bed.

“Will you fuck me?” Cougar asks, and Jake’s head pops up, eyes wide.

“If you want that,” Eliot assures him. Jake closes the laptop and Eliot really hopes he finished enough clean-up that the upcoming sex isn’t interrupted by the police knocking down their door.

“Cougs, you sure?” Jake asks as he joins them. He swishes Cougar’s ponytail to the side and kisses the back of his neck.

“Si,” Cougar says and meets Eliot’s eyes. “I want that. I want you.”

Of them all, Jake still seems the most on-edge. “Look,” he says, blue eyes meeting blue over Cougar’s shoulder, “Just to be clear, since my Mexican Silent Bob wanna-be isn’t going to say it, this is ‘apology accepted’ sex, right?” he searches Eliot’s face. “This isn’t anger-sex. This isn’t hate-sex. You don’t get to hurt him.”

“I don’t plan on it,” Eliot promises. Cougar lets out a breath and Eliot realizes that maybe he was braced for it to be some sort of revenge-fuck.

Jake relaxes too, reaching up and taking the rubber band from Cougar’s hair, sliding his fingers through all that beautiful darkness and setting it free.

“Got you, Cougs,” Jake murmurs against his neck. “Eliot’s got you too.”

There’s something going on, something Eliot is missing, but he takes Jake’s cues, leans in to kiss the corner of Cougar’s mouth as his hands slide his outer shirt off of his shoulders, slow smooth caresses down his arms. Jake draws the undershirt up over Cougar’s head, leaves teasing kisses across his shoulder.

Jake walks them back towards the bed, crawls on and urges Cougar to come up with him. Eliot unfastens Cougar’s pants and pulls off his boots while Jake opens the bedside drawer and pulls out lube and condoms. His focus is all on Cougar, like he doesn’t even see Eliot getting naked, and that would hurt, if he couldn’t sense the deep water just a step away.

Jake settles himself up at the head of the bed, stroking Cougar’s hair, drawing him back to rests his shoulders on Jake’s chest. Eliot stretches out over him, kisses down his throat and chest, licks circles around his nipples, blows lightly against the trail of hair from navel to pubes, smiling when Cougar groans and squirms. He flicks his tongue over the head of Cougar’s dick, so smooth, damn he tastes so good. He brushes his fingers over Cougar’s balls, the crease of his thigh, back down between his ass-cheeks and Cougar jumps, his gasp caught in Jake’s mouth.

“Yeah,” Jake whispers, “Want this, don’t you? You want him.”

Eliot gets the tube of lube, pops the cap. Cougar’s hands clench in the bed covers, the muscle in his jaw tenses as Eliot slides a slick finger over the tight pucker of his ass.

“It’s okay,” Jake soothes. “Look, it’s Eliot. He’s got you,” and Cougar’s eyes open to look down, to see Eliot there between his knees, to watch his arm move as Eliot slides one finger into him, slow and gentle until he starts to relax.

“Gonna be good,” Eliot promises. “Gonna take care of you, darlin’.”

Jake snorts a laugh. “And you guys say my lines are corny.” But his eyes are warm with affection, like he’s grateful to Eliot for breaking the tension.

Eliot slips another finger in, and Jake distracts Cougar from the beginnings of a stretch by playing with his nipples, circling them, tugging them. Eliot gets the third one in and Cougar starts to softly swear in Spanish, his eyes closed and lips parted with breathy pleas.

“He’s ready,” Jake says and Eliot slides the condom on and slicks it up. He moves in closer, lifting Cougar’s left leg up over his shoulder, lining himself up.

“Cougar,” he calls softly, “Come on, I need you to look at me.”

Cougar opens his eyes. He looks fucked already, glazed and disconnected.

“Are you ready?” Eliot asks, because messing things up now is a land mine he’d rather not step on.

“Si,” Cougar says, “Fuck me.”

Eliot presses in, slow and steady and inexorable. Pushes in until he bottoms out, until Cougar is panting with the stretch of it and Eliot’s shaking to hold himself back, to not fuck hard into that heat and tightness.

“Jesus,” Jake whispers, “Look at you two.”

Eliot reaches down between their bodies, takes Cougar’s dick in his still-slick hand and strokes him, keeping him hard when he may have lost some of his arousal.

“You still with me?” he asks, and Cougar nods. He pulls back a few inches, thrusts in again slow. Tries another time, longer, stronger. Feels Cougar shifting to meet him, legs relaxing, opening himself up.

Jake just stays where he is, petting Cougar’s hair, whispering about how beautiful they are, how hot and sexy it all is.

“Come for him,” Jake murmurs and leans down to lick Cougar below his earlobe. “Come for him, you sexy beast.”

And then Cougar laughs and comes, body tightening around Eliot’s dick, drawing the orgasm out of him.

He’d love to collapse after, but forces himself to pull back, to get rid of the condom and close Cougar’s legs. He curls in beside him, as they both ease back down and Jake watches over them.

“We’re real glad we didn’t fuck things up,” Jake says and Eliot shakes his head. The last thing he wants to think about in the afterglow is Sophie covered in blood.

“Stop talking about it then,” he grouses and nuzzles in against Cougar’s hair.

Cougar moves, languid and slow, hand reaching out to where Jake’s dick is pressed against the jeans he’s still wearing. Presses hard with the palm of his hand and rubs him through the thick denim. Jake hisses and squirms, gasps out “Here, let me…” and tries to unfasten his jeans with one hand and Cougar still laying on him.

“I got it,” Eliot says and sits up to reach over and undo the button and zipper, to pull them open and down, just enough for Jake to get his dick out of his underwear. Cougar licks his palm and reaches out to stroke him, Jake’s fingers curved over the back of his hand, guiding, urging, and Eliot watches as Jake spurts thick and white over his t-shirt.

They’re beautiful, but they aren’t his. Not for keeps. They belong to each other, and Eliot rolls to the side of the bed, swings his feet down to the floor so he doesn’t have to watch the tender way Jake pets Cougar’s hair, the way their eyes meet.

“I should get back to my team,” Eliot says. He’s pretty sure Nate didn’t believe his story, and Hardison or Parker could decide to go looking for him at any moment.

“Yeah, okay,” Jake says, and Cougar’s fingertips brush over Eliot’s spine. There’s shifting around behind him, and then Jake is at his side, a plain white business card with a ten-digit number on it held out on Jake’s fingertips. “This is us,” Jake says. “We’ll be out of the country for a while, but if you ever need us, need anything, call, okay?”

Eliot nods and picks his jeans up off of the floor, tucks the card into the pocket.

“I will,” he says, though he can’t imagine why he would.

===============

Hardison pokes through hardware specs on his i-Phone, alone again in his room, and thinks about how weird it is to have nothing to do after a job, no loose ends to tie up, no data to erase. If it was anybody else, Chaos maybe, or that Haardvark dude, it would make him crazy, not knowing if they got everything, but this is J-mageddon, and Hardison has never heard of him getting caught. A little thrill still goes through Alec’s stomach, to have run up against a hacker of J-mageddon’s caliber, to be thought of as a threat. Next time, man… His brain is already spinning with the system he’s going to build next, the safeguards he’s going to put in place. Completely separate hardware managers to stop him from doing that over-over-clocking thing he did. New firewalls, not so much strong as flexible and…

“Why doesn’t Eliot just say what he means?” Parker pipes up, way too close to the back of his ear, and he startles, juggles the phone and clasps a hand to his chest.

“Girl, don’t do that.”

She hops over the back of the hotel couch and settles in next to him.

“When he said he was going to hit the gym? By Gym he meant those guys, the hit team with the sniper and the hacker who fried your computer. I wonder which was which. And by hit? He meant lots of sex. Does that make any sense to you?”

Heat rises up Hardison’s neck, flushes his cheeks warm with embarrassment. “I did not need to know that,” he protests, but the image is already there, Eliot and Jensen and Alvarez. “Why’d you have to go and tell me a thing like that?” he asks Parker, but she’s distracted with the puzzle of semantics and not paying attention to him.

=============

Eliot almost calls them after Moreau, after the team sees what he is, what he’s done. A dozen hired guns dead on a warehouse floor and Eliot the only one to walk away. He sits on his bed, the place where they’d fucked him and he’d fucked Jake and holds that white card in his hand, stares at the numbers until they’re as impossible to forget as his own name.

“Call if you need us,” Jake had said, but Eliot’s pretty sure this isn’t what he meant. “If you need us to shoot someone,” maybe, or “If you need to borrow a hundred grand.” Not “If you need somebody to hold your hand because you’re scared your team will look at you different.”

He sneers at his own weakness and puts the card back in his wallet. Whatever happens, however bad it aches, he deserves it, with all the people he’s hurt for money. He’s just sorry for Sophie and Parker and Hardison, to have their trust trampled upon. So many times he tried to tell them; he wishes now they’d believed him.

==========

He comes home from the next job, and there’s another of Jake’s white business cards pushed under his door, and he feels a pang of regret that he missed them. Somehow it’s good to know though, that they’re back in the country safe, and that they thought of him. He thinks about calling, not that he really needs anything. Jake would say something ridiculous. Translate Cougar’s eyebrows and lip-quirks over the phone. They might be gone again already, but he’s sure they’d make him smile.

He considers having Hardison trace the phone, just to see where they are, how close, but he doesn’t feel like buying him a new computer if Jake takes offense at the snooping.

=====================

“He has a crew,” Cougar reminds Jensen, knowing it won’t put an end to his pouting.

Jensen drops himself onto the sagging mattress of their latest dive hotel. “No, I know that. I just thought. You know. That we were in town, so maybe.”

Truth to tell, Cougar had hoped, also. For another night, for Eliot’s calm and strength. For the chance to rest, knowing Jensen was watched over.

It wouldn’t be the same, but he offers anyway, “We could go out. Find someone.”

Jensen turns his head, meets Cougar’s eyes. “Do you want to?” He sounds guarded, like he’s asking for Cougar’s sake and not his own desire.

“No.”

A smile flickers over Jensen’s sweet mouth. “Will you fuck me?” he asks, and Cougar rolls his eyes. Like he’d ever say no to that.

“Hey Cougar?” Jake asks after, their sweat cooling in the breeze from the noisy air-conditioner, “You know, right? That this thing, this Eliot thing. It doesn’t mean I want you any less.”

Cougar tucks in closer to Jake’s back, against his warm and sweaty skin. He thinks about “this Eliot thing,” and yeah, it’s something. He’s not sure what he would name it, but it’s there. He thinks about Jake, with Eliot, and there’s no burn of jealousy, no fear. Just the warm spark of desire. The soft brush of comfort.

“Go to sleep,” he tells Jake, lips pressed against his shoulder. They’ll try again next week, hope to catch Eliot then.

=============



Okay, so Hardison is not a man who likes to complain (Wait, okay, he enjoys complaining, but usually only so people recognize the difficulty of the project they’ve dumped in his lap; he rarely means it), but Nate’s to-do list is out of control. “Look, man, I may be a genius? I may be able to create a website, build Sophie a background as she spins it and hack a god-damn financial institution at the same time, but not while I’m playing Ruprecht the monkey boy!”

He throws his hands up in frustration because otherwise he’s going to commit an epic keyboard smash and he cannot afford the time it takes to switch out equipment at this stage in the game.

“I trust you to get it done,” Nate says and Hardison wants to scream.

“I can only divide my dice pool so many ways!” he yells at Nate’s back.

Nate just continues out of the van, leaving Eliot and Hardison in the buzzing cocoon of electronics.

“Call Jake,” Eliot suggests.

Hardison considers. The man certainly has the skills. It feels a little weird to call in back-up, but the worst that can happen is he’ll say no.

He expects Jake to give him shit for it, to rub it in his face that he’s gotta call in backup to do a job he should be able to handle on his own, but the man is straight-up professional about it, “Tell me what you need me to do,” and not screwing around like Chaos would have done.

After, when Hardison has the time, he clicks through the resume J-Mageddon made up for Sophie, the ten years of job history. On impulse he hacks one of her “previous employers” and there she is in their personnel files, job-reviews, tax forms, social security, everything.

It’s good work. Damn good work.

=========

Eliot’s been hit by cars, bulls, motorcycles, muscle-men and fast-strikers, baseball bats and crowbars, bullets and once by a frozen leg of lamb. He still wouldn’t have predicted that getting smashed by a carnival ride would hurt so damn bad, knock him out for what Parker said was nearly a full minute. A fist-fight afterward, while he’s still dizzy from being concussed? That didn’t help anything, either.

“You need a hospital?” Nate asks when the fighting is over.

Eliot is careful not to shake his head. “I’m fine. Looks worse than it is.” He cleans up in the carnival’s abandoned men’s room, glad for the privacy as he washes off the blood, puts Steri-strips on the cuts and bandages the wounds. A hospital visit means tests, drugs, strangers’ hands on him when he’s helpless. He can hold it together until after the debriefing and then curl up to lick his wounds alone, can and does. He even has a “nurse” lined up to keep the guys from worrying, an escort named Brigitte that he once helped out of a bad situation.

He holds it together until he’s out of the bar and into a cab, lets his eyes close as they drive back to his place. Brigitte’s fingers are cool on his arm when the car stops and he tosses the driver a few bills without looking at them and gets out. “Eliot,” she says as they walk up the building’s front steps and into the main hall, “I don’t mind helping you out, not at all, but I don’t really think I’m qualified to…”

She goes tense and Eliot looks up and sees two men coming down the stairs. He steps out in front of her, even knowing he’s about as effective as a two-day-old kitten right now.

“Eliot?” Jake’s voice is high-pitched with distress as he closes in the last few feet and reaches out. “Jesus fuck, what happened to you?”

Eliot clenches his jaw (and remembers why he didn’t want to do that as pain laces through the left side of his head and all the way down his spine). He doesn’t want their pity, doesn’t want them to see him like this.

“Sorry,” he says like he really isn’t, “Not in the mood to be a fuck-toy tonight. Maybe next time.”

“No fucking shit!” Jake snaps back, and Eliot’s surprised the guy is so pissed about not getting laid.

He steps around Jake but Brigitte doesn’t follow. He looks back and her eyes are wide. He follows her gaze and Cougar is staring her down. Eliot sighs and opens his wallet, passes her a couple hundred bucks tip. “Take the rest of the night off,” he tells her, not that he was planning on letting her past the threshold of his apartment anyway. “It’s okay, really. Treat yourself to something nice,” and she smiles uncertainly but goes.

He takes a slow breath and steels himself. He has to get rid of these idiots, and then walk up one flight of stairs, and he can crash. That’s all. He can do this. Should be able to do this, but Jake is behind him somehow, and Cougar in front, gazing into his eyes and gently turning Eliot’s face towards the overhead light.

“Don’t,” Eliot says, but it would hurt too much to pull away. “Get the hell off of me, Cougar.” Fuckers listen about as well as a brick wall, Jake hemming him in while Cougar does a quick once-over there in the stairwell.

“Yeah, okay, I’ve got him,” Jake says and Eliot thinks he just missed a little time there. “Come on, El,” Jake urges, “One foot in front of the other or I’m carrying you up these stairs like a prom date who’s had too much champagne.”

“I got it,” Eliot grumbles, “Leave me alone already,” but they go up with him and he’s panting and seeing spots by the time they get to his floor.

“I say we vote on it,” Jake says, “Leaving Eliot alone in his apartment with nobody to bring him soup. All those in favor?”

Eliot manages a growl, but he’s sure as hell not raising his hand for this shit. He’s not positive he could raise his hand if he tried.

“All those opposed? Sorry, Eliot, we voted; you’ve been overruled.”

“Not a damn democracy,” he grumbles and leans on Cougar as Jake frisks him for his keys and opens the door. There’s another white card on the floor and they step over it as they half-carry Eliot into his own place.

“If it’s not a democracy, then it’s a military oligarchy, might makes right. Seriously, are you going to try to stage a coup right now against Cougs and me? Really?”

They move him through the living room and down the hall to the bedroom, and he’s done with fighting, knows a losing battle when he sees one. Jake piles and fluffs his pillows and then the pair of them get him horizontal.

“Med-kit?” Jake asks, and Eliot can’t help but remember the first time they were here, Jake asking for wash-cloths to clean them up.

“Closet in th’ hall,” he answers and Jake goes to get it while Cougar starts stripping him.

“Said not in th’ mood,” Eliot protests, and even he can hear his words starting to slur with exhaustion.

“Don’t be an asshole,” Cougar admonishes, tone fierce and angry. “This? Is not sexy.”

Eliot focuses up at him, sees a glitter to his eyes that’s never been there before. Jake comes back with the med-kit and Cougar blinks rapidly. Something in Eliot’s stomach twists to see it, even the hint of tears in the tough man’s eyes.

“Eliot,” Jake calls softly, “If we have to take you to a hospital, what ID do you want to use? Just in case I don’t have time to make you one.”

“Floor safe, built in under the kitchen sink.” He rattles off the combination and Jake nods like he’s memorizing it. “Eugene Watts. Good insurance.”

“Got it.” Jake steps out then and Eliot wonders if they’ve already decided he’s too banged up to deal with at home, but he comes back with a glass of water and a straw and Cougar hands him some pills and he swallows without asking what they are.

He doesn’t remember falling asleep, not even the moment when Jake pulled the straw away from his lips. He wakes and the sun is out, a bright streak through the part in his curtains. Cougar is there in a chair by the bed, still and quiet, his pistol on the nightstand. Jake shares the bed with Eliot, asleep, glasses off and fingers occasionally twitching like he types in his dreams.

“How do you feel?” Cougar asks, a soft whisper.

“Fucked,” Eliot answers, his tone assuring that it’s not in the good way.

Cougar brings him some more pills and water and he sleeps again, knowing he’s watched over.

The next time he comes to, it’s because there’s movement, someone fucking with his hair and he flinches awake, Jake’s hands on his shoulder holding him down, quiet words soothing him. “It’s okay,” he says, “You’re safe. We’ve got you.”

Eliot lays his head down again and Jake goes back to what he was doing, spreading Eliot’s hair out, strand by strand, dabbing it with a wet cloth and picking the knots out with a small comb.

“It was really matted,” he says, like the state of his hair is high on Eliot’s list of concerns. “You’ve got blood in here, and like engine grease of some sort.” He sighs. “Did this for Cougs once. He. He got taken. Didn’t make it back to the rendezvous. They had him six days. Six days of Clay and Aisha plotting, trying to make the rescue into an attack, trying to ‘make Cougar’s suffering worth something.’ Like getting him out alive wasn’t as important as how much we could hurt Max in the process.”

Eliot opens his eyes and Jake’s lips are pressed tight together. “Pooch and I finally said ‘Fuck it,’ and went and got him. But yeah. His hair was a mess, man. I didn’t even want to know what all was in there. Took me three days to get it all clean and straight.”

Eliot wonders if that was what fucked Cougar up, sex-wise, wonders if he used to talk more. Six days is plenty to break a man, even a strong man.

He falls asleep again before he can ask, Jake’s gentle touches soothing him.

Turns out, six days is enough to put a man back together, too. They stay until he’s on his feet again, can cook his own meals and wash his own hair. They guard his sleep and bring him take-out from some really good restaurants. Jake spends a day on the computer and then announces that Eugene Watts has a brother, James, to call if he’s ever in need of a next-of-kin. He leaves a backup set of ID in Eliot’s safe, just in case.

The last night, they make love to him, gentle hands and mouths, slow kisses. They fall asleep when they’re done, Eliot between them, arms overlaying his stomach to touch each other and him at the same time.

He’s alone in the morning.

============

They visit more after that, once a month, maybe more. They stay the nights now, sometimes three or four in a row if he isn’t on a job, and he sleeps between them. He gives them a copy of the keys to his place and it seems like a major thing. If they were different men, he would see if they wanted to help out with a con every now and then, but he can’t see the crew working with a man whose primary skill is putting bullets into people from a long way away. He isn’t sure Jake could trust Nate’s brand of leadership, his need-to-know intel distribution and “Trust me to fuck with you but not fuck you over.”

Sometimes, when they leave to go to whatever job they’ve taken now, he thinks about going with them, leaving the effort of hiding what he is, what he’s capable of, from his team. He can’t quite wrap his head around it though, leaving them to find another hitter. There’s nobody he trusts to be as good as he is, to care as much as he does.

Jake and Cougar slip out of his grasp with a wink and a smile and an unspoken promise to come back again, and he lets them.

===========

The Leverage crew is between jobs and Eliot’s planning to use the time to re-stock his freezer with some good meals that he can re-heat or bring to Nate’s for everybody when time is tight and stomachs are empty. He’s in the gourmet grocer’s when his phone rings, Parker’s number and he answers knowing either something really bad has happened, or she’s going to give him a headache with her nonsense.

“Yeah?” he answers as he looks at the meat in the display case, contemplating how much of the grass-fed beef he needs for a big batch of curry chili.

“So I’m at your place, because I have a necklace I wanted to show you, and there are men in your living room,” Parker states without preamble.

He leaves his cart and heads for the door, “Where are you? What are they doing?”

“I’m on the ledge outside. I can’t see in because your curtains are closed, and they’re…bickering? One is saying there’s no use making bets anymore if they both always choose Eliot and Eliot always says yes.”

Eliot stops and turns back to his cart. “They’re allowed to be there. Don’t startle them, though. Just go downstairs and I’ll…” his phone beeps that there’s an incoming call. “Hang on.” He switches connections, barks “What?” into the phone.

“Hey Eliot,” Jake’s chipper voice greets him, and that headache is starting to build. “Your blond burglar is out on your ledge, should I let her in?”

These are parts of his life that he really shouldn’t mix together, but both are important to him, and Parker will make him crazy with her questions if he doesn’t. He signs to the butcher that he’ll take four of the Kobe sirloins. What the hell.

“Sure,” he says and hopes he’s not making a huge miscalculation. It’s not until he’s on the way back home with food for four that he thinks about what Parker said, about Jake and Cougar always choosing him. He thinks maybe, just maybe, he’s not the only one for whom this is becoming something more.

The apartment is quiet when Eliot gets there. Silent except for Jake on the couch tapping away at his laptop, either negotiating their next job or maybe battling against Hardison’s “clan” on that wow thing they both talk about.

“Hey,” Jake says without looking up.

Eliot isn’t sure if his casual non-concern at someone coming in behind him is a show of trust in Eliot’s home security or a serious flaw in his sense of self-preservation.

“Hey,” Eliot returns. “Where’s Parker and Cougar?”

Jake closes the laptop and looks up at him, a faint edge of unease in his expression, the set of his shoulders.

“They um.” He gestures vaguely over his shoulder. “It was totally her idea, man.”

Oh, Eliot thinks. So it doesn’t mean all that much to them after all. He sits heavily on the couch, lets the shopping bag fall beside his feet. The apartment is still eerily quiet, so at least they aren’t doing it in his bed.

“You cooking tonight?” Jake asks, hopeful and worried too. “They’ll be back in an hour or so.”

And Eliot can be a man about this. There were never any promises made on either side. It’s not like he hasn’t fucked anybody else since they started this thing. Just because it’s been a couple of months doesn’t mean anything. Just. Parker and Cougar. He trusts the man. Knows he’ll be good with her. Just hopes she knows it’s not a permanent arrangement.

“Yeah,” he says, getting his shit together. “I brought steaks. Thought we’d take them up to the roof and fire up the grill.” He stands and picks up the bags, figuring he’ll start them marinading now and work on the sides until Cougar and Parker get back.

“Eliot?” Jake asks, more serious than Eliot usually hears him. “You aren’t pissed, are you?”

“Why would I be pissed?” he asks, hearing the anger leaking out all over.

Jake shrugs. “We know you’re not the biggest fan of guns. Him teaching her to shoot. This is your team; if you don’t approve, we’ll back off or something. Not sure how anybody says no to that girl, though. Maybe we’ll leave the country for a while until she stops asking?”

Eliot bangs around in the fridge to hide the stupid relief Jake’s words give him. He gets out the balsamic vinegar and Dijon mustard, a couple other jars. He pulls down a bowl and mixes up a quick sauce. So not fucking then. Shooting. He plays the idea over in his head, Parker with a gun.

“She’s going to anyway,” he finally decides. “A couple months ago, that job that left me laid up for a little while. She took a rifle off of a Russian sniper. Not so much planning to shoot anyone with it, just flash the laser sight and do a little intimidating. I had to point out, after, that if it’d gone off it would have taken the target and Nate too. I think it scared her.”

“Good,” Jake says, “I mean not good that she has to handle the guns, but good that if she’s going to, she’s learning from the best. And good that you’re okay with it and we’re not gonna be hiding in Alaska or something until she loses interest. I seriously don’t want to ever have to hide from either of you.”

Jake’s voice gets closer and closer as he rambles. It’s no surprise when his hands settle at Eliot’s waist, no surprise when he nuzzles Eliot’s pony-tail to the side and licks at the side of his neck. Kind of a surprise when he turns Eliot to face the room and sinks to his knees. They’ve never done this, Eliot and one of them without the other. He trusts Jake not to lead him into breaking some sort of rule, because if they are, he’ll never see Cougar’s shot coming.

============

Cougar checks back with Jensen, skimming the cross hairs of the scope around his shape as he passes by. He scans the sidewalk cafe for potential problems, for feds or cops, for the client’s back-up, for any sign of a double-cross.

He hates these meetings, when the potential client insists on a face-to-face. They’re too vulnerable, just the two of them, Jensen tied up with the talking instead of hacking, no wheel-man, no demolitions, no strategist.

He sees the client coming up on Jensen’s six, recognizes the set of his shoulders and the roll of his walk from the videos Jensen found in the preliminary recon.

“On you in three, two, one,” Cougar counts down into the throat mic.

“Mister Montgomery,” he hears Jensen say, his own microphone a little tinny, smaller and better hidden, his back still to their contact. Cougar smirks as the client falters and looks around. Perfectly off balance for the interaction.

“Please,” Jensen says, his voice confident, and turns to meet the man’s eye, “Have a seat. I hear you have a project for my team.”

Jensen talks. The client talks. Cougar tunes it out except to listen for Jensen’s code words for potential trouble. He’s busy, watching Jensen’s back, making sure it ends as smoothly as it began. Half a mile away a patrol car crosses the road that Cougar’s sight line runs down, keeps going and doesn’t turn back. The pattern matches the route Jensen told him to expect; he notes that they were on schedule and moves his focus elsewhere.

“You’ll hear from us in an hour,” Jensen tells Montgomery, and Cougar keeps the cross hairs on the man’s back until he’s in his car—keeps them on the car until it’s out of sight.

“Clear,” Cougar tells Jensen, and Jensen smiles but doesn’t betray Cougar’s location by looking that way.

“Meet you back at rendezvous one,” Jensen says and finishes his latte as he stands up.

Jensen is sprawled on their hotel bed when Cougar gets there, file open under his hands, still dressed from the meet. He calls it his “Serious Business” suit. The clothes he wears to meet clients and act like a grown-up in. Cougar secretly thinks he’s dressing up like Clay, in his white shirt and black suit. Imitating the closest thing he’s ever had to a father figure, for all that Clay ended up letting Jensen down too, in the end.

Cougar also thinks that Jensen makes it look a hell of a lot sexier than Clay ever could, and as soon as they decide on this client, he plans to eradicate any thought of their old CO from either of their minds.

“So?” Cougar asks, nudging the file as Jensen flips the last photo over.

“It’s bullshit, fucked on way too many levels.” Jensen says, and sits up to tick them off on his fingers. “Okay so first, he wants his former lieutenant killed before he can testify in a federal court. Even if we wanted to, we don’t have the manpower to run a distraction and the hit, and make sure you get away clean.

“Second of all, I’ve been through his finances, and he can’t pay what he’s promising until the feds release the hold they’ve got on his funds.

“Third, the job’s centered around the federal courthouse in Boston. I don’t like working in Eliot’s back yard.”

The silent fourth lingers unspoken: that Jensen prefers to avoid the wet-work, that he’d rather take jobs where people die when things go wrong, not when they go right. That he feels like he’s whoring out Cougar’s soul every time he asks him to put a bullet in someone.

Cougar nods, and thinks for a moment to see if he can come up with any reason to counter Jensen’s decision. “Pooch? The girls?”

Jensen shrugs. “Pooch says him and Jolene are okay for now. He’s working and the IDs I made for them haven’t gotten pinged anywhere. Amber and Hailey are doing pretty good. I’d like to top off their savings account soon, but we can live without this job.”

“So you’ll tell him no,” Cougar says, and tosses his hat to the bedside table. He’ll shower while Jensen makes the call, and then he’ll strip the stark black and white of those clothes off of his man, fuck him senseless, reclaim him from the realm of dark and serious thoughts this meeting has brought him to.

And hell, they’re in the neighborhood. Maybe tomorrow they’ll drive in to Boston and see if Eliot has some time for them.

==============

“Eliot!” Jake hollers from the kitchen. His momma must be so ashamed. “Eliot, where’s your coffee?”

Eliot sighs and pulls his mouth off of Cougar’s dick. “You drank the last before I went to Saudi Arabia. Get your own and quit your bitchin’.” He goes back to what he was doing, long slow strokes down Cougar’s shaft, the sensual roll of Cougar’s hips rising to meet his mouth, like a tango in slow motion. Jake would be whining by now, wanting more, faster, now. Cougar’s into the long game, patiently letting sensation build. Eliot thinks about that chick he dated who wanted to show him tantric sex (four months ago, his brain supplies, along with the boggling thought that she was the last person he fucked that wasn’t Jake or Cougar). He wonders if Cougar would be into that, if maybe he should find out more how it works.

“Hey!” Jake pops his head in the door, grinning by the sound of his voice. Cougar groans and arches his back and Eliot tongues his slit, savoring the sharp metallic taste of him.

“You guys need anything while I’m out?”

“No,” Cougar gasps out. Eliot chuckles around his cock, shakes his head without pulling back, tugging Cougar this way and that.

“Damn you guys don’t make it easy to leave,” Jake complains. “But I’m gonna be useless in about an hour if I don’t thin down the blood in my caffeine stream.”

Cougar hisses at a particularly clever flick of Eliot’s tongue and he waves the other man out. Eliot pulls off enough to warn, “If you bring back some Maxwell House crap you’re sleeping on the couch tonight.”

“Like I would,” Jake grumbles, but Eliot has seen the junk that man eats and he wouldn’t put it past him to chew on instant coffee grounds if it would get him more caffeine, faster.

He turns his attention back to Cougar’s body, pushing one knee up and out of the way and leaning in to nuzzle his balls, nosing in beneath them to take in Cougar’s scent and then his taste. Teasing at the tight pucker of his ass with his tongue, licking and prodding. He won’t fuck Cougar, not without Jake to spot them, but this is almost as good, making him gasp and groan, hands gripped into the sheets as Eliot layers on pleasure after pleasure.

He wonders if he could keep this up until Jake gets back from shopping, have Cougar hard and ready for that ass as soon as Jake walks in the door, half out of his mind with the orgasm so long denied. It wouldn’t take much to get Jake ready; it never does, always so easy, so eager. He shudders at the fantasy. Guiding Jake down onto Cougar’s dick. Running his fingers slick around the place where their bodies join. Edging one in and then another as Jake whimpers at the stretch and begs for more. Cougar pulling out so that not even the entire tip is inside. Eliot’s dick pressing tight against Cougar’s, both of them squeezed tight in his hand. His other arm around Jake’s ribs, pulling him down onto them. Jake’s head rolling back as he comes all over Cougar’s chest at the pressure of both of them filling him at once, so tight they can’t even move beyond Jake’s trembling.

And then Eliot’s coming, rutting against the sheets while he swallows Cougar down to the root, takes him into his throat and hums out his pleasure. He digs his thumbnails in, just enough, just at that spot above Cougar’s hipbones that gets him every time and Cougar cries out for the first time, slams into Eliot’s mouth and fills him.

Then it’s over. They lie panting and sweaty, sated and exhausted. Eliot doesn’t know which of them is more work, Jake with his eager athletic sex-capades or Cougar with the slow burn and fiery finish.

“Shower?” Cougar asks in the afterglow, and Eliot chuckles.

“Yeah.” He feels like Louisiana in the summer. Hot, sticky and smelling like a swamp.

They share the shower and it becomes its own sort of sensual. Not sexy so much as intimate, Cougar’s soapy hands on his body, washing his hair, touching every part of him.

When they’re done they towel off and get some clothes on. Eliot expects to step out of the bedroom and into the smell of coffee, but there’s no scent in the air, no noise in the apartment anywhere.

Cougar frowns and looks at the clock, but neither of them checked it as Jake was leaving so it doesn’t mean much. He gets his phone while Eliot sprawls on the couch, turns on the TV but leaves it muted. Cougar dials and listens and Eliot imagines the rings, counts them in his head, knows it’s gone to voice-mail by the minute creases that form by Cougar’s eyes.

“Jake. It’s coffee. It can’t take so long to find. Whatever shiny thing has distracted you, put it down now and call me, pendejo.” He ends the call and drops the phone onto the couch, grabs his boots and starts to pull them on, lips pressed tight with anger or worry or both.

Eliot can’t, won’t, sit while Cougar goes hunting down their wandering lamb so he goes after his boots too. They hit the streets, pausing only long enough for Cougar to load his pistol and tuck it into the waistband holster. Eliot has the best intel of coffee shops and grocery stores nearby, and Cougar knows which things Jake would be distracted by— an ironic piece of graffiti, a vintage Atari in a junk-shop’s window, a store that carries an extensive selection of bright-colored t-shirts.

Half an hour in and another message left on Jake’s phone, annoyance turns to true worry.

“Your hacker?” Cougar asks Eliot and yeah, maybe Hardison can get into the traffic cams, see what the hell happened. Guys like Jake don’t just fall off the map, not without a fight.

He pulls out his phone to make the call, but just then Cougar’s phone rings. Cougar opens it up and has it halfway to his ear before he realizes that wasn’t the call-ring, but the text-ring. He pauses and then carefully taps at it, and then goes perfectly still.

Shit, Eliot thinks, before Cougar even passes him the phone. It displays a single image from an unknown number. Jake. Blood on his face, glasses missing, that damn cocky grin on his lips. Tied to a chair somewhere in front of a plain white wall. Eliot isn’t even conscious of the shift, as the soft edges of him sheer away and he goes cold and hard, focused on the job at hand and nothing else. He scans the tiny photo for clues, but doesn’t see any at this resolution. Guys like Cougar and Jensen, there are too many reasons why someone would want to take one of them. Money, revenge, leverage, political statement.

“We need to get this phone to Hardison,” Eliot says, “See it bigger and let him try to track whoever sent it.”

“I’m coming with you,” Cougar says and Eliot wouldn’t have tried to stop him. They head back to Eliot’s place at a run, already calculating possible angles and responses.

For the first time in a long time, Eliot’s fingers itch for the cold weight of a gun in his hand, for that much death and destruction at his fingertips, for the bloody option in his grip awaiting nothing more than a thought to end life after life.

He phones Nate as he and Cougar get into his truck. “Call the team,” he tells the mastermind, “I’m coming in with a job. This is personal, and urgent.”

==========

The next message comes seconds later. Cougar holds the phone so Eliot can see as he drives: An image of a man with cross-hairs over his face and a very precise location: address, floor number, southwest balcony corner. Be there, the directions order, Eliminate this man before he enters the courthouse at 2:15 today. Do it and get paid the previous offer. Don’t, and …

“I know this man,” Cougar tells him, “Adrian Montgomery tried to hire us to kill him last week.”

Eliot nods and drives, already planning it out. Three hours. There’s a lot they can do in three hours. “The target’s name?”

Cougar shrugs. “Jensen would know.”

Inconvenient, Eliot thinks. Not critical.

“Text him back that you need proof of life.” He digs out his own phone and calls Hardison.

“Hardison’s computer services, you smack ‘em, I hack em,” he answers, and Eliot isn’t in the damn mood for jokes right now.

“I’ve got a name, Adrian Montgomery. It looks like he’s taken Jake. I need everything you’ve got on him. Everything. We’re ten minutes out.”

“Ten minutes?” Hardison squawks, but Eliot can already hear his fingers attacking the keyboard, and he knows the hacker will have something useful by the time they get there. He glances over at Cougar as he drives, evaluating how the man deals with the stress. Focused, he decides, wishing every client kept their shit together as well when things went wrong. This may be personal for them both, but Cougar’s approaching it with the same professionalism as Eliot.

Eliot parks in his reserved spot and they flow naturally into a small-unit formation as they head up to the office, Eliot in front and Cougar two steps behind and slightly to the left of him.

The team is already gathered when they get in, Nate pouring himself a drink and Sophie checking her hair in the small mirror she carries in her purse. Eliot knows he’s got them off-balance, with a client they know nothing about and no time to prep.

“Cougar?” Parker asks from where she’s standing over Hardison’s shoulder, “They took Jake? How is that even possible?” A muscle in Cougar’s jaw bulges as he clenches his teeth, and if Cougar wasn’t so busy beating himself up over letting Jake out of his sight, Eliot might be worried for Parker’s health.

“It doesn’t matter,” Eliot cuts in, “Adrian Montgomery tried to hire them last week and was turned down. Now he wants Cougar to complete the job, or he’ll hurt Jake. We’ve got less than three hours; I need to know possible locations for where he could be keeping a hostage. We search until we find him. If it looks like it’s taking too long, we need to delay a federal witness’ security de--.”

Cougar’s phone chirps for an incoming call and Eliot gives him the go-ahead, mouthing the word “speaker” at him. Cougar presses the button. “Si?”

“Cougs?” Jake’s voice, no doubt about it. “Cougs, don’t! It’s a—” There’s the sound of a blow and a moment of silence. Cougar takes a long breath in, slow and even.

“Are you satisfied?” a different man’s voice asks.

“Yes,” Cougar answers.

“Will you do what I ordered?”

“Yes.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

The phone goes dead and Cougar closes his eyes, that muscle in his jaw still the only outward sign of just how angry and distressed he is.

“Okay,” Nate cuts in, all sharp edges and irritated pride, “Hardison says that this ‘Jake’ is J-Mageddon, who fried his computer once, and helped him out a different time.” He narrows his eyes at Cougar. “I’m assuming this is the sniper who took out Rubino?”

Eliot takes half a step between Cougar and Nate, not sure himself who he thinks he’s protecting.

“They’re family,” he says, firm as bedrock. Sophie watches, her dark eyes unreadable. Behind him, Eliot can hear Hardison still working hard at finding everything he can on Montgomery.

“They’re killers,” Nate counters.

“So am I,” Eliot growls, feeling things spiraling out of his control faster than he would have thought possible.

“Not anymore,” Nate tries to tell him, trying to make his vision of reality the truth just by saying it enough times.

“Okay, so,” Hardison says from behind Eliot, like there’s no argument going on, and everyone turns to him. “I’ve got four possible locations—places that Montgomery owns, that the feds haven’t discovered yet, that he could possibly keep a prisoner in. I can work on tracing his phone on the way, but it’s gonna take some time and we might get lucky at the first place.”

“We’re not taking this job,” Nate objects, “When we started this thing, the five of us, you all agreed I had veto power over the clients we took. That I would be your conscience, that you could be crooks and good guys at the same time. It’s what you all chose, what you all wanted. As your conscience, I’m telling you, taking sides with a hit-man against a mob boss is in no way a clean job.”

Nate sits there so calm, so fucking earnest that Eliot wants to punch him in his serene fucking face. Cougar’s hand on his shoulder stops him though, and he turns to look at his…fuck-buddy? Friend? Lover? And son of a bitch, this is not the time to start trying to define what the hell they all have between them. Cougar tilts his head towards the door, asking Eliot to go with him. If he’s pissed at the waste of precious time, he doesn’t show it.

“Nate, man.” Hardison sounds disappointed. “If you can’t see that helping family is always the right thing to do, I sure as hell don’t want you playing Jiminy Cricket to my Pinocchio.”

Sophie stands, looks Eliot in the eye. Pained. Torn. “I…I can’t,” she says, looking past Eliot to Cougar, and he remembers her covered in Rubino’s blood and doesn’t find it in himself to blame her.

“I’m helping Cougar,” Parker announces, as soft and firm as Eliot’s ever heard her. “Lay it out, Hardison, what do we do?”

Hardison starts the briefing, pulling up locations and timing, spinning a plan off as he goes. It isn’t perfect, and if Jake isn’t at one of the locations that Hardison found, it could all go to shit, but it’s as good a plan as anything Eliot can come up with on such short notice. Somewhere during the discussion, Nate and Sophie leave, and Eliot knows that’s gonna hurt later, but he can’t allow himself the distraction.

Five minutes later, the team splits and they’re out the door, Eliot and Hardison leaving in the van, Cougar and Parker in Eliot’s truck.


================

Montgomery ends the call, a smile on his lips. Even with all the cards stacked against him — a lieutenant turning on him to testify to the feds, almost all of his resources seized, limited manpower behind him, a botched hit by his best guy turning the heat up on the whole situation, and he is still a fucking force to be reckoned with. If you can’t keep a good hit-man on staff, hire one, and if you can’t pay one, kidnapping a man with few friends is easier than killing a well-protected one.

He looks down at the blond-haired faggot who thought he could pull one over on Adrian Montgomery, pretending he had a whole team at his back and not just one wetback with a sniper rifle.

He pulls his foot back and kicks the fucker in the gut for trying to scam him. He gets a grunt of air but no other sound of pain. If he had the time, if he wasn’t wearing his good suit for court later, he’d really go old school on this one, make a fucking example.

Instead he takes a deep breath and straightens his tie.

“Willis, take him back to the room.” He can’t help but notice the hungry twist to the big man’s mouth, as he looks down at the hostage. God-damn homos are everywhere these days.

"Just lock him up and come back here,” Montgomery orders, gotta spell out every little damn thing with dregs like this.

Willis reaches down and grabs the pretty-boy by his arm and hauls him up, making him wince as his wrists pull against the cuffs. The idiot gives Montgomery a bloody smile and a wink as Willis shoves him along, a spring in his step like he isn’t planning on dying today.

“The fuck are you smiling about, Sparkles?” Willis asks.

“I know what’s coming for you.” The guy grins like a shark. “And man is it gonna be ugly. I mean, uglier than you already are.”

Willis hauls off and punches him in the kidney, which Montgomery can approve of, except if he gets too enthusiastic he might kill the punk.

“Make sure he can talk if he needs to,” he warns.

“Got it, boss!” Willis sounds almost cheerful.

Montgomery takes another cleansing breath as Willis bullies the hostage back to the room they’ve been holding him in. A few more hours and it’ll be over. The spic will take out the traitor as he goes into the courthouse, Hopkins will take out the spic (Hopkins might be mediocre with a rifle, but hitting a skinny Mexican from above has to be an easier task than getting a kill-shot on a federally protected witness from half a mile away), Willis will tie up his loose end and Adrian Montgomery walks away the winner, again.

His plan is perfect.

=================

Hardison pulls up outside the boarded-up dry-cleaner’s, parks Lucille haphazardly across two spaces. Eliot has boots on the asphalt before the van’s in park, moving smoothly up to the door and breaking it opened with a concentrated application of force. He can feel time trickling through his fingers. Either the target is going to show up at the courthouse and Montgomery will find out Cougar isn’t taking that shot, or Jake’s gonna do or say something incredibly stupid and get himself killed.

The place smells like dust and rat-shit, no signs out front that anybody has been through in the last year, but Eliot makes a quick sweep anyway, past the lint-covered conveyor racks and pressing tables, over to give a quick glance into the fur-storage freezers.

Nothing.

Again, nothing.

He trots back to the van, and Hardison closes his laptop to drive again. As pressed for time as they are on this job, Eliot knows Hardison is searching for anything he missed on the first search, anything that can help.

“I’m here,” Parker’s voice comes over the comms.

“In position,” Cougar echoes.

“Still looking,” Eliot says, and “We’ll find him.” And if Jake isn’t breathing when they do, God help every single person who had anything to do with it.

=================

Hopkins huffs out an annoyed breath and scans the sidewalk with his binoculars. He should be doing this job, taking this shot, killing the traitor who would dare turn on his boss. Just because he missed the last time, just because the feds are taking his protection twice as seriously because of it, that’s no reason for Montgomery to pull in outside talent.

He skims the post-lunch crowd, and the cowboy hat stands out against the dark suits and bright skirts of the office-workers. The man stops in his tracks, like he can feel Hopkins watching him, and he lifts his face, slowly scanning the rooftops, and Hopkins gets a good look at him, the big nose and sharp chin, a mean face like a coyote or something.

Then the guy starts walking again, back-pack on his shoulder, and he goes into the building he’s supposed to.

Hopkins waits and watches, and the hit-man comes out on the assigned balcony, his head tipped down as he pulls the rifle out of his bag and starts assembling it. He reaches for his phone and hits speed-dial one.

“Boss,” he says, “He’s here.”

==================

Eliot shoves past the startled cook, the smell of week-old fry-grease clinging to the man as he is directed out of Eliot’s way. This is the last location, the least-likely, and it’s empty of anything Eliot cares about. No Jake, no Montgomery.

Fuck, he thinks, over and over as he looks into the store-room just to be sure. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Hardison! He’s not here.”

The cook is trying to dial 911 on his cell-phone as Eliot storms out again, but of course Hardison has the signals blocked. No cops until they’re ready.

“I’m still…” Hardison begins, but his voice breaks off suddenly. “Eliot! Next door. The phone tracks to there, and the building is leased to Montgomery’s cleaning lady.”

The band of tension eases from around Eliot’s chest, and a feral smile curls his lips. Jake has to be next door, and everyone else there is going down hard.

=============


Montgomery smiles and closes the cheap burner phone, tosses the ugly little thing over to Willis.

“Hopkins says the sniper is in position. He’ll call you when the witness and the sniper are dead, and you can finish off our guest and get rid of the evidence.”

Willis grins at the thought and Montgomery frowns. Sure, Jensen’s a fag, but he’s got some reputation as a man who can take care of himself, and Willis has a bad history of underestimating anybody smaller than he is (which is ninety percent of the world). “Don’t take too long, and don’t get sloppy. Do not take those cuffs off while he’s still breathing.”

Willis nods like one of those damn dogs people used to put in the back windows of their cars. “Yessir, boss. Got it, boss.”

Montgomery pulls down his sleeves, straightens his thousand-dollar cuff-links. Willis takes the phone and heads to where they’re holding the prisoner, probably to start his entertainment early so he’ll have as much time as possible before he snuffs the guy. Soon, Montgomery reassures himself as he checks his tie, makes sure he’s tidy for court and heads for the door. Soon, he’ll be able to hire real talent again, move putzes like Willis and Hopkins back to positions where he doesn’t expect them to think.

He collects his briefcase and heads for the door. That’s enough hands-on work for the day. The plan is in motion, everything set up and fool-proof. Now, to be seen with his lawyer, to put on his show of shock and outrage as his former associate is shot dead in front of him.

He opens the door, and on the other side is a man, long-haired and scowling, looking like he was just about to try the knob. Montgomery’s eyes go wide with surprise and then narrow with outrage. “You can’t be here without a warrant, asshole.”

He doesn’t even see the fist that hits him, snapping his head to the side and leaving his mouth full of blood. The guy steps in, closing the door behind him.

“Willis!” Montgomery shouts as he gives ground, “Willis! Kill this mother-fucker!”

The guy cocks his head, waits for a second, but Willis doesn’t show. Montgomery’s heart pounds in his chest.

“You know who I am?” the guy asks, low and calm and ugly. Montgomery shakes his head.

“I’m Eliot Spencer.”

The blood drains from Montgomery’s face. His hands feel numb.

“D-d-Damien Moreau’s enforcer?”

The guy, Eliot, he grins. Or snarls. Or something that’s both at the same time. His teeth are very white.

“Yeah, that Eliot Spencer. You’ve got something that’s mine.”

Montgomery stumbles back, wishing he hadn’t put his gun away when he got ready for his appearance in court. Spencer advances on him, smooth like a shark.

“I’m sorry!” Montgomery protests, “I didn’t know! What are you…”

“I’m gonna go collect my boyfriend now,” Spencer tells him, “I’ll catch up to you later.”

Another of those blindingly fast fists hits Montgomery in the jaw, then another and another. He’s unconscious before he hits the ground.

==============

For all his outward calm, Eliot’s heart is pounding as he takes care of the asshole who had the nerve to take Jake from him. It feels good to finally hit something, to have an outlet for the fear and anger coursing through his nerves.

The guy had looked to his left when he called for the back-up that never came, so Eliot heads that way, down the narrow hallway, opening doors as he goes. He wants to shout for Jake, to hear his voice, to know he’s okay. He can’t risk whoever this “Willis” guy is getting the drop on him, though, using Jake as a hostage against him.

He’s tried three doors when he hears a muffled shout, the sound of a blow being landed, and he skips the next five doors, sprinting down the hall and shoulder-checking the last door open.

Jake’s on his feet, bloodied but unbowed, and Eliot sways with the rush of relief. The other guy, a massive bruiser with an unfortunate mustache, he looks like he’s taken a shot or two, too. Eliot wouldn’t say Jake’s been kicking his ass, but it looks like he’s been holding his own, and for a man with both wrists cuffed behind his back, that’s doing pretty good.

Even as Eliot takes in the scene, Jake circles around, maneuvers Willis so he’s the one who has to step over or around the broken folding chair that’s in the way. The guy rushes in, and Jake tries to keep him back with a sharp kick to the knee. Willis is braced for it though, winces at the strike but wades through. Jake rushes in to meet him then, ducking under the first swinging punch to close tight, long leg snapping up in neat, quick, strikes, pounding his knee into Willis’ floating ribs, even as he keeps his head in too close for Willis to deliver an effective punch.

“Jake!” Eliot calls, and the fighters break apart, breathing heavy.

“Eliot?” Jake asks, like he’s surprised to see him, just for a second, before deep dismay overtakes his features. “Eliot, fuck! Cougar! It’s a trap! They’ve got—”

“It’s okay,” Eliot assures him, plucking a lock-pick from his bracelet and stepping behind Jake to get at the cuffs. One of Jake’s wrists is badly swollen, probably broken, and Eliot regrets that they’re running a job in the midst of a federal investigation and can’t afford to leave corpses. Willis fidgets, wanting to make a break for the door, but not liking his chances against two guys, especially with Jake’s hands free. Eliot takes a warning step towards the goon and he shuffles back again, no spine, no initiative.

“Cougar’s okay,” Eliot repeats, in case Jake missed it. “We know it’s a set-up; it’s always a set-up.”

Jake pulls his injured arm up against his chest, looking determined. Eliot doesn’t like it, Jake going back in, but he can recognize Jake’s need to finish what he started. Even if he can’t hit with the bad hand, his balance will be better with it in front of him, and he’ll have his right to strike with.

Jake turns his head and grins at Willis. “Okay, asshole,” he says, “Where were we?”

It’s the most glorious ass-whoopin’ Eliot’s had the pleasure of watching. Willis is in need of an ambulance by the time Jake’s done with him, but the feds are on their way. Eliot figures they can take out the trash.

================

Hopkins keeps his eyes on the sniper, listening to the squawk of the small radio beside him, tuned to the band the feds are using.

“Red-bird one, coming in for a landing,” one marshal tells another, and that’s their target. He resists the urge to watch the asshole’s head go splat. He’ll hear about it in just a second, and then he absolutely needs to put a bullet in the spic’s back. One bullet, and the boss will know how valuable he is, how important. No more languishing in the minors for him, buddy. He’s moving up to the big-leagues now.

Any second now, the wetback is gonna fire. Any second.

But he doesn’t.

“Red-bird one is in the nest. Repeat, Red-bird one is in the nest.”

Hopkins fumbles for the phone. The fucker didn’t take the shot! Didn’t even try!

The sniper rolls over onto his back, and Hopkins blinks. That’s not the guy. It’s not even any guy; it’s some girl with a gun. A gun pointed at his face.

He watches, too shocked to shoot her.

She grins, and winks, and he feels a sharp jab in his right butt-cheek. He startles and looks back, and there’s a fluffy red dart sticking out of his jeans. The god-damn sniper is standing ten feet behind him, a dart-gun in one hand and a six-shooter pistol in the other.

The last thing to go through his mind is a high-powered, fast-acting sedative.

==========

Hardison drives them all to Eliot’s place. Parker runs ahead to open the door and Hardison hovers around, like he’s torn between following them up and giving them some privacy.

“Tell Nate I’m taking the week off,” Eliot tells him, “Don’t let him schedule anything without me, no matter how safe it seems.”

“Yeah, I’ll let him know,” Hardison assures him, and if Eliot didn’t have more pressing matters, he might be worried about the thoughtful look on Hardison’s face.

As it is, he and Cougar have a drugged-up Jake to manage between them, barely putting one foot in front of the other up the front steps of Eliot’s building.

“Can’t believe you made me go to an emergency clinic,” Jake complains. Pain makes him a whiny bitch, when he runs out of ass to kick and adrenaline to burn. “Th’ doc gave me the speech. The ‘love shouldn’t hurt,’ speech. What th’ hell, man?”

His wrist is in a cast, but the doctor said the break looked clean and should heal without long-term issues. More troubling is the bruised kidney. Keeping Jake on bed-rest until he stops pissing blood is gonna be a barrel of laughs.

Parker is waiting at Eliot’s door, and she gives them a little half-smile and leans in to touch her fingertips to Jake’s less-bruised cheek before surfing the stair-rail back down to Hardison.

Cougar and Eliot steer Jake through to the bedroom, where he makes a pest of himself wanting another pillow and a cup of water and bugging Cougar for a God-damn bedtime story, wanting to hear again about Parker playing decoy while Cougar sneaked up on the counter-sniper. It’s a relief when he falls into a restless sleep, sprawled and propped and swaddled in the only comfortable position he can find. Neither Eliot or Cougar are willing to risk waking him up so they make arrangements to crash elsewhere.

“He is a worse patient than he is a hostage,” Cougar comments, and Eliot wouldn’t have thought that possible before he saw it.

=========

“Cougs,” Jake’s low voice wakes Eliot where he’s sleeping in the lounge chair in the living room. He looks over to the couch, but Cougar has already gone to Jake’s side, may have been there for a while already.

He walks over to the bedroom door, to see if they need anything. Cougar is stretched out in the bed beside Jake, his muscular back lit by the dim light from the bathroom. Jake cards the fingers of his good hand through Cougar’s unbound hair, slow and soothing.

Eliot turns to go back to his chair, to leave them their privacy, but Jake calling his name stops him, and he walks to the bedside. “You need anything?” Eliot asks, and Jake softly smiles, his face bruised, his lip split, but still so damn beautiful.

“We need you here too,” he says, and Eliot hesitates still, because this is their moment, and he’s—something outside.

A flicker of uncertainty passes over Jake’s face. “Is this about Willis?” he asks, and when Eliot is too boggled by the question to figure out a response, “Him trying to put his dick in me? Because he didn’t, but even if he had, it would be better than a bullet, you know? I’m okay, but I would really really like it if you would come lay down.”

Eliot has to take a deep breath. He hadn’t known, but he should have figured. The reason Willis would have gone into the room without a weapon. He wants to tell Jake that it wouldn’t matter, wouldn’t make Jake less in his eyes, if he hadn’t been able to fight him off, but he can’t find the words for that either. He climbs into bed instead, sliding his arm across Jake’s waist to rest his fingertips against Cougar’s skin.

He doesn’t sleep, not for a long time.

==============

Jake sleeps for almost twenty-four hours and wakes up cranky. Luckily the fact that Cougar has already retrieved his spare glasses from their go-bag, that his laptop is by the bed, plugged in and powered up, and that Eliot has crepes just coming off of the stove takes the edge off of his annoyance at being told he can only walk as far as the bathroom and back. He’s still got visible blood in his urine and Eliot’s giving it two more days before he takes Jake to a doctor smarter than some walk-in-clinic yutz who was stupid enough to believe Cougar or Eliot were hurting Jake.

=============

Eliot and Cougar take turns hanging out with Jake, watching TV or reading while he occupies himself on the computer or sleeps. When either of them goes out, they wear ear-pieces so nobody can disappear without a clue again. Eliot goes jogging, spends some time at the gym. Cougar goes for ‘runs’ with Parker. Eliot wonders if either of them touches ground for miles.

At night, Eliot and Cougar curl around Jake, skin on skin, sharing warmth and breath, as close as three people can be without it being sex.

And it’s not sex. Jake isn’t up to it, and it wouldn’t be like fucking while one of them is somewhere else, Cougar out with Parker or Jake wrapped up with urgent computer stuff. It just doesn’t seem right to screw around with Jake right there, too banged up to be in the mood.

Three days in, Eliot sees Cougar coming out of the shower, shimmering with dampness, hair curling down in wet waves, towel hanging off of his hips by the loosest of knots. He has to look away, because he wants to grab him, to clench both hands in his dark hair and hold tight, to slam him against a wall and kiss him until he tastes red.

The fourth morning, he wakes up to Jake’s good hand low on his stomach, sneaking under the waistband of his boxers, blunt fingernails scratching at his happy-trail. Jake places a teasing little kiss-lick on his shoulder, and Eliot burns with the need to roll over and fuck Jake into the mattress, to feel Jake’s wrists in his hands, Jake’s skin between his teeth as he pounds into him.

He doesn’t need some walk-in-clinic doc to tell him that this isn’t right, that these aren’t things you think about actually doing to the people you love.

He jerks away, leaves Cougar sleeping and Jake horny and goes out to the kitchen. He’s not even sure what the hell is wrong with him, the things he’s thinking. The part that scares him the most is they probably could and would take whatever he could dish out, let him burn this fire in his chest out into their bodies and never even think to ask for an apology after.

Jake comes to him, there in the kitchen, finds him chopping every vegetable in the refrigerator, no plan at all of actually cooking anything.

“You pissed at us?” Jake asks, and Eliot’s knife goes still, his head drops. He hurts and he doesn’t even know why.

“No,” he rasps, puts his hands on the edge of the counter and leans there.

“You pissed at me?”

Eliot’s second “No,” is more of a growl. He wants to say I couldn’t trust myself to be gentle, but what comes out is “Y’all are leaving again.”

Jake sighs out a quiet “Shit. Eliot,” and Eliot is glad Jake doesn’t try to touch him right now, “If we could. If it was just us and just you, I swear to God we’d be picking out curtains and china-patterns right now.”

The idea of it makes Eliot snort, but the ache in his chest doesn’t lessen. He wants to mark and keep and claim them, hold them so tight nobody can ever tear them away from him. He burns with jealousy for whoever it is that takes them away from him like this.

“No ugly little flowers.” Of course Cougar woke up. Eliot’s seen him sleep through Jake banging on his computer, an action movie on the TV and the bass of a truly epic car stereo thumping through the wall but be instantly alert at a muffled curse when Jake stubbed his toe. The plaintive thread of distress in Jake’s voice now must have cut through his slumber like a knife.

“But big pretty flowers would be okay?” Jake, unable to resist teasing.

“Whatever makes you happy,” Cougar answers, and it’s about more than shared dishware.

“What can we do?” Jake asks, and Eliot shakes his head.

“I can’t have what I want. I know that.”

“We’ll come as close to what you want as we can, then,” Jake promises. “We’ll take a little more time between jobs, come home more often.”

Jake calling Eliot’s place ‘home’ is like a punch to the chest. He turns then, and Cougar is right there, taking Eliot into his arms, catching him, keeping him. Eliot meets his lips with a crashing kiss. He knows how this story ends; he knows they can’t stay, and he can’t go, and one day they won’t come back to him and all he’ll have left is a brief moment of vengeance and a half-empty future that he’s not sure he can live with.

He’s too weak to say no. To turn them away now, when he might be able to survive the wound. To make them leave and never come back and let him pretend forever that they’re safe and happy somewhere far away.

He wants this, and they’re offering, and he grabs on with both hands and doesn’t let go.

It should be Jake’s turn, Eliot thinks as they strip him naked there in the kitchen, pushing the bowl full of chopped zucchini to the back of the counter, the cutting board and knife into the sink. Cougar and Eliot should be focusing on Jake, his first time since he was taken, but then Jake’s casted wrist grates against his hip, his other hand squeezing and spreading Eliot’s ass and Cougar is leaving hickeys down his chest.

“More,” Eliot begs, and Cougar bites down on his shoulder as Jake’s thumb pushes into him, slick with Eliot’s cold-pressed sunflower seed oil. Cougar’s calloused hand wraps around his dick and they milk him for every bit he’s got.

They’re still on the kitchen floor, nuzzling and touching, sharing lazy reassurances after the orgasms, when Eliot’s phone chirps. He fumbles in his pants pockets, has to read it twice for the English language to make sense.

“Hardison,” he says, “Wants to come over to talk.”

”Give us 30” he texts back.

The shower is only big enough for two, so Jake drags Eliot to clean up while Cougar starts putting the kitchen back in order. They’re all looking suspiciously damp-haired but otherwise tidy by the time there’s a knock on the door, Hardison carrying a stack of pizza boxes, laptop case over his shoulder. Parker shadows in behind him.

Eliot passes out the beers and he and his boys take the couch, leaving the chair for Hardison to sit in and Parker to perch on the arm of.

“So what’d you want to talk about?” Eliot asks, when everyone’s had a slice of the pizza.

“Okay,” Hardison starts, “You all know I’ve always wanted to start my own crew. Well, you and Parker, at least. The way Nate does things, it’s hard to live with sometimes. I think you can run a con without keeping secrets from your crew, manipulating them and lying to them.”

Eliot clamps down on the part of himself already running the angles, already daring to hope. He glances left to Jake and sees an answering glimmer in his eyes, though. Cougar on his right is unreadable. Parker’s hand rests on Hardison’s shoulder, backing his play.

“I think I’m ready,” Hardison states, confident but not arrogant. “I want to move into the mastermind position, share hacking and grifting with J-Mageddon here. Leave Eliot doing what Eliot does best. Parker still as thief and part-time arm-candy. She says Cougar’s got good moves getting in and out, just needs a little training on the harder-core security measures. He can take care of some of her infiltration and observation jobs and back up whoever needs some extra muscle.” He shifts in his seat. “We still need a female lead, maybe see if we can call on Tara, even if it’s just temporary until we find someone we’re all good with.”

Jake nods. “Yeah, maybe. It’s just. We’ve got outside monetary obligations. People counting on us.”

Hardison bobs his head in agreement. “I get that, man, I do. But how long are you gonna be able to fulfill those obligations, just the two of you?” He opens the computer, spins it around to show Jake a screen full of charts and graphs. “We got here your insurance plan, sick days, 401K, long term investments, full dental. There’s a signing bonus to take care of your obligations while you heal up this time.”

He pauses, letting the idea sink in. “You’ve got people to back you up if you run into trouble you can’t handle.”

Jake looks to Cougar, hopeful, wanting this. Eliot sits back and lets them hash it out in a silent discussion of eyebrows and shrugs.

“Eliot?” Jake asks, when he and Cougar have reached their decision.

Eliot bows his head. This isn’t how he wanted it, walking away from Nate and Sophie, the team splitting up. But he knows, he’s seen it, that Hardison won’t be part of it forever. He’s gonna break off eventually, and maybe this thing with Jake and Cougar has pushed that timetable up, but it hasn’t created the situation.

“I want you two here,” he says, and thinks, Not at any cost, but this cost is one I can bear to pay.

“Yeah,” says Jake, not a ghost of doubt in his voice. “We’re in. The three of us—we’re in.”

Hardison rubs his hands together and Parker grins.

“I’ll meet with Nate,” Hardison assures them, “Tender our resignations, quick and to the point.”

Eliot nods. “I’ll get some names for him. Maybe not the strongest hitters, but people he can count on.”

“Okay,” Hardison grins, half professional business man and half eager geek. “So. Six weeks until the cast comes off?”

Jake nods.

“Okay, I’ll see if I can find some small jobs for us to run in the meantime. See what it looks like with just Parker, Eliot and Cougar as active parts. Nothing fancy, nothing messy.”

Hardison holds out his hand and Jake and then Cougar shake it. “Welcome aboard, gentlemen,” and then he stands and grins. “We’re gonna just go and get outta your hair. Let you get back to whatever activities you were up to.”

Eliot walks them to the door and locks up behind them. Stands there a minute with his palm against the reinforced hardwood. Letting it sink in, that he can have what he wants. Jake and Cougar, close enough to protect, to see every day, to have them here in his home and his bed for as long as all three want that.

“Hey,” Jake’s voice calls him, soft and close, and Eliot turns to find them both behind him.

“This is good, right?” Jake asks, serious and uncertain.

“Yeah,” Eliot says, and his voice is wrong, thick and low. “I didn’t think…”

“We’ve got you,” Jake says, and holds out his hand. Eliot takes it, reaches for Cougar with the other, and Jake draws them both in for a huge hug.

“So we get to pick out curtains now?” Jake asks and Eliot laughs. He's learned long ago to not expect perfect in life, but this is pretty damn good.

Comments

[peaceful_sands]

Congratulations on posting!

[embroiderama]

This is really, really wonderful. I love the way the relationship between the three of them starts with hot sex and develops into so much more, with the caring and the comfort, and I love the way the new team comes together. This needs to be a TV show now! The dynamics between the three of them--all of them really, are so tasty both emotionally and physically.

[snarkasaurus]

gya, this is gorgeous. i love both canons and the way you mixed them together is so incredibly gorgeous. thank you so much for posting. this is gorgeous.

[cougars_catnip]

Wow, well done. I really like that you didn't split up Cougs and JJ and that the addition of Elliot didn't break them, it rather enhanced them ( if that makes sense?)

Hugs and welcome home.
CC

[nonniemous]

*applause*

I love this, right down to Nate's being an asshole and breaking up the team and Hardison forming his own team with these guys. Totally can buy this, and it's wonderful to see the guys taking care of each other.

[nagasvoice]

I love your Eliot, I love the way Jensen and Cougar become comfortable with him, how Eliot reacts when Jensen gets kidnapped.
And future potential there is awesome, I love the idea of Hardison and Jensen hacking as a team together.

[sasha_feather]

I really enjoyed this. :)

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks, and thanks again for your beta-work.

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks! It's really funny--I can't imagine Eliot in a relationship with only one person. It always feels off-balance. Throw in a duo, and it all falls together.

Heh, I have ideas for the team's future. I think Hardison really underestimates Cougar, and his versatility.

I have visions of Chaos running across Hardison's van and thinking he's hacking against Hardison, up until the moment Jake busts into Chaos' van and shoots his computer because he doesn't have time for this shit.

I had no real idea how the ending was going to work until I got there. Because Eliot wouldn't leave the team, and the whole team wouldn't work with Jake and Cougar. I didn't want Nate to be a complete dick, but he and Sophie just couldn't do it. I was surprised and pleased with the Cougar+Parker friendship and how Hardison+Jensen worked.

[ladyjanelly]

Awww. Thanks. :)

[ladyjanelly]

Split up Jake and Cougar? Never. Seriously, never. :)

I think I could only ever write threesome fic if they all ended up together and happy and more because of the third person.

Thanks, it's good to be home.
-Janelly

[ladyjanelly]

Heh. I was sort of stuck at the end, looking for that happy ending, and Nate throwing down ultimatums really helped out with that.

For a trio of tough guys, they sure snuggle well, don't they? :)

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks so much! It was a really fun fic to write, taming Eliot, bringing Jensen and Cougar into a family/team again.

Heh, with Jensen and Hardison as a team, no server is safe, anywhere.

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks!

[sian1359]

Great mix, great read.

[rhi]

Oh, man. I would not have thought of that threesome, but it really, really works. I love the Cougar & Parker friendship, and yeah, I can see those five as a new team, too. Lots of great touches in here, from the Har-dwire to Cougar knowing who they'd propositioned when Jake didn't, to Eliot cooking for them and them having the good sense to appreciate it!

Thank you, I really enjoyed this!

[raine]

Wow. Plausible, sexy, and you leave me wanting more. Bravo!

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks!

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks! I had a lot of fun with this one. It's funny, but I feel Eliot works best in a threesome, rather than a couple.

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks! I think "plausible" is the biggest challenge, both in threesome fics and action/adventure fics, so I'm really pleased you liked it.

I'll most likely have something else in this setting.

[devilc]

I have been saving this story to read on a "rainy day" -- oh dear goodness the 3 of them in bed is an uber- manwich.

What I think I liked best is you kept Jake and Cougar their crazy selves and played them off of Eliot. Your Jake voice is perfect.

Also. Hot.

And ... you kept Jake an off-kilter BAMF -- not a little flower easily broken. I loved that he took down Willis.

Finally, I like that Cougar and Parker have a special mutual understanding. ;)

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks! The idea of these guys together was driving me crazy, back when I was writing the Mutant!Cougar AU and the Jake-left-the-military!AU, and I knew it would drive me crazy, so I wrote the little "Five times Eliot was part of a threesome" fic and it just made me even more eager to see where things would go with the three of them.

Eliot makes a great straight-man for Jake's babble and Cougar's...Cougarness.

Jensen might be the least combative of the three, but under the word-vomit he was as much a soldier as any of them. When an ass needs kicking or somebody needs to be shot in the face, he's mentally and physically capable.

Man, Cougar+Parker. The trouble those two are going to get into. :)

Thanks for reading. Glad you enjoyed it.

[frostfalcon]

this was great... I can almost see the whole story in my brain like a movie! very well written!

[ladydragon76]

This was really amazing and awesome!! Great job! You nailed the characters so well, and man! SEAMLESS job with the crossover. WOw! just... WOW! ^_^

[princesslanie67]

squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! i love these 3 together. i need to start looking for more of them. thanks for sharing.

[sceaterian]

I really loved this. I don't even watch Leverage but this was fantastic. I like how you humanized their characters. People tend to write Cougar and Jensen as caricatures and sometimes that works but this story had so much depth.

[ladyjanelly]

Thanks! I dunno, maybe it was because I read all the Cougar/Jensen fanfic well before I saw the movie (and I mean ALL of it), but I kind of feel like I'm writing them as original characters loosely fit into those dudes that were in the movies. :)

[weesta]

My sister gave me The Losers DVD for my birthday so I'm on a Losers fic kick. I've read this story twice in the last 12 hours because it's perfection! This story makes SO MUCH SENSE to me from the way they picked up Eliot in the bar, to their growing relationship, to building a new crew at the end. I love that you made Jensen playing with Cougar's hair more intimate than what they'd all done the night before. And seriously...the three of them together....so damn hot!

[ladyjanelly]

I'm so glad you found this.
The Losers was really a fandom that hit me hard. I was writing 2 more full-length fics when I had the plot-bunny for this one, and so I put it out as one bit of the "5 times Eliot is invited to a threesome" fic, but then went back and delved into it deeper. This fic was really the one that cemented my love of writing in Scrivener. The whole double-cross action-climax part I actually wrote in reverse, from the counter-sniper's ending back to when Eliot and Hardison split off from Cougar and Parker.

Here's my AO3 Losers tag, and there are some other awesome fics over there too: http://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyJanelly/works?fandom_id=223427

[nagi_schwarz]

I never knew I needed this ship till I read it. Perfect.

[tchouli]

great story
excellent crossover
perfect trio
thank you