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They stumbled in the bedroom backwards. Like in the movies. Kissing and tearing at their jackets in a hurry to get everything off.
Except, it was Maverick trying to wiggle out of his jacket as Ice held on to the lapels of it and gentled every rushed kiss that Maverick pressed up at him. “Easy, easy,” he soothed between kisses.
“Ice,” Maverick growled dragging the letters of the callsign out. “Come on, I won’t break,” it had been a phrase he’d repeated for what felt like a million times in the past week. Ever since he’d checked himself out of hospital - Ice had attached himself to his hip. And done just about everything except what Maverick wanted him to do. “Come on.”
“Patience,” Ice breathed smoothing Mav’s jacket, holding him by the waist to stop him from falling gracelessly over raised edge of the carpet.
“That is your strong suit, not mine,” Maverick quipped back and decided to change his tactic and switched his assault to Ice’s button-down shirt. “Ice cold, no mistakes, my ass…”
Ice pushed forward to move Maverick over the carpet to limit any stumbling opportunity and then moved to pacify his partner’s hands before they pulled out any buttons. “Pete,” he said, a low note of pleading in his voice.
And Maverick dropped his hands, his shoulders lowering in defeat. “Ice…,” he sighed. “I don’t get it.”
A worried expression crossed Ice’s face before he managed a small smile. His hands were heavy but tender as they settled on Maverick’s shoulders. He caressed downwards, across Maverick’s arms. “What don’t you get?” Tom asked softly, his hands in constant contact with Pete, caressing from shoulder to wrist, straightening his jacket down the front. Gentle affection in every movement.
“I love you,” it became easier to say every time he said it and that made Maverick wonder how it had taken so long to make it past his lips in the first place. “You love me,” an unsettling feeling roiled in his chest, something that had the aftertaste of doubt, but he delivered the statement confidently enough. “Why won’t you touch me?”
The smile that settled in Ice’s features became soft. “I am touching you.”
“You know what the fuck I mean,” Maverick said as he moved away, frustrated.
Ice followed. “Pete, you got out of hospital a week ago…”
“Exactly!” A whole fucking week.
“A week ago,” Ice continued patiently, “Against doctor’s orders. You say you feel fine, but the things you said…”
“If I’d known that telling you that whole coma dream thing would put you off, I would have not…”
“And I appreciate that you told me,” Ice continued, making his parry in the interrupting-each-other game that they were now playing. “But please understand…” and here Maverick didn’t have to interrupt him, because breath just caught in Ice’s throat. The memory of that week in the hospital still had the power to freeze him in his tracks. Those endless nights that he had spent by Mav’s bedside begging, praying for him to wake up.
“Understand – what?” because he wanted to scream. In all the lives that he’d seen, dreamed – what he remembered from them was that when it happened between them, it was easy. Easy for him and Tom to come together, but here – he’d poured his heart out and Ice kept him at arm’s length. He couldn’t help but think – maybe this is the right world, the right time, the right me, just… The one place where Ice doesn’t want me. “Is it cause you think I’m crazy?”
Ice laughed, against his will, it was just Maverick’s effect on him, “I’ve always thought you’re crazy.”
Maverick was not amused.
“Pete… This is new to you,” Ice started again. “No, wait,” he raised his palm to shush Pete as he saw him start to object, “This is new to you, and I don’t just mean being with a guy, but the very concept,” of loving me. Ice hated how this very conversation felt like a standoff. He consciously relaxed and moved to sit at the foot of the bed.
“I’ve loved you for thirty years,” he said openly. He was old enough, confident enough that there was no need to hide or dress up his words. “I’ve known it for almost as long. So don’t act like I don’t want you, I don’t know how not to want you. But you have been hurt. And I will wait as long as I need to for you to be okay before I put any stress on your mind and body that might hurt you.”
For a moment Maverick didn’t know what to say. But then, incredulously, “What kind of sex are you used to having?!”
Ice took one look at his would-be-lover’s perplexed expression and felt like banging his head on the nearest flat surface. But in context of Maverick that was a feeling he was very familiar with. “The doctors were worried that they would have to drill a hole in your skull to relieve pressure on your brain. You are one walking bruise. Any kind of sex will be stress on you.”
And Maverick heard it. But try as he might, he also heard – I don’t want you – with it. He’d been through so much to get to this place. He’d broken apart and put himself together and he’d held himself together through an epic crash, and being lost in the woods, and doubting his own existence, and it was still all wrong. In a distant part of his mind he knew that that’s not what Ice was telling him, but he couldn’t help how it felt. It felt like he’d been blind for so long that there was no way to fix it. It felt like he was too late. It felt like he wasn’t enough. It felt like always. Like always - he couldn’t do anything right, not in a way to make it last. He felt saltwater in his eyes but didn’t know why he was crying.
“Pete, breathe,” Ice was in front of him in a blink of an eye. His presence a steady, soothing thing. No mistakes.
Maverick tried to take a deep breath, opened his mouth and no words would come out. He shook his head. Shit. It was ridiculous. He was nearly sixty, he was… He should be above breaking down. And yet here he was – everything in him laid open before Ice and he was struggling to breathe.
“Pete, I’m not rejecting you,” Ice’s hands were all over Maverick. On his shoulders, caressing his cheek, brushing away the tear that dropped from his eyelashes. “God knows, you’re the only thing I’ve ever wanted this bad. Please hear me when I say, I only ever want to love you in a way that won’t hurt you.” For a man that was used to issuing commands shortly, Ice never seemed to run out of words when speaking to his wingman.
“I just want to be close to you,” every word was a struggle for Maverick. For someone who could talk endlessly, he always run out of things to say with Ice. Everything was too much, feelings too confusing and powerful.
“And you are,” Ice drew him into a hug. “You so are,” he said, his hands caressing Mav’s back as if he was a skittish colt. “Okay,” he breathed, his touch light as he pushed Maverick’s jacket off his shoulders. He moved to hold the back of his lover’s head gently, “We’ll go slow, okay?” he asked drawing back to look Maverick in the eyes, to have promise and understanding. “And you will tell me if there’s anything that you feel is off, if you don’t want something, if you need me to stop for any reason.”
“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Maverick, moved forward capturing Ice’s lips in a kiss. From his perspective Ice worried needlessly.
“Slow,” Ice mumbled angling his lips away, kissing the side of Maverick’s mouth. “Means,” next kiss moving closer to jawline, “slow.” He trailed kisses along Mav’s jaw, down to his neck, just as he pushed the jacket all the way down Mav’s arms.
“You’re always,” he kissed along the neck, along the collar of the white t-shirt Mav was wearing, “running so fast, always past the speed of sound.” His fingers teased the bottom edge of the shirt as he moved to kiss the other side of Mav’s face. “Let me love you,” his touch was gentle across Mav’s shoulders and chest – both mindful of lingering bruises and exploratory. “Like you deserve to be loved, please,” his kisses trailed back before their lips connected. “Hear me, let me show you.”
Tom was being so careful and delicate to him that Maverick felt his earlier worries fading away. He just wanted to melt in Ice’s touch, but he was never one to let go easily. He rapidly pulled his shirt off, nearly punching Ice in the jaw and barely managing to hide a wince at the strain across his bruised ribs that the action caused, “Well, hurry up then and take the shot.”
Ice snorted with suppressed laughter – amused and worried almost equally. He’d hardly expected anything else. In answer he laid a kiss on Maverick’s collarbone and moved them closer to the bed. “I see you’re determined,” he whispered against his skin, as he pushed him to lay down on the bed. “So am I,” he raised a challenging eyebrow as he meticulously unbuttoned his own shirt.
Maverick met his gaze and went for his jeans. Two could play at this game.
Ice groaned and dropped to the bed, blanketing Mav’s body with his own, holding his weight on his elbows. “You are incorrigible,” he muttered, shifting more to the side so that he could touch Mav more.
“Distinguished too,” Maverick shot back moving with Ice to kiss him again.
“One of a kind,” Ice agreed easily, kissing him back and then warming his chest with lingering touches, skimming over the yellowish bruises, caressing him across the entire length of his side, then arm, wrapping their fingers together. Squeezing. Releasing. “Turn around.”
Slightly confused, Maverick complied easily just as Ice sat up and reached into the bedside table. Mav pillowed his head on his arms, his jeans felt heavy on his hips. And a moment later Ice touched him again. His hands slick with oil and Maverick was about to ask – what are you… When Ice pressed down on a knotted muscle in his shoulder and all Maverick could really do was sigh.
“There you go,” Ice whispered. “Relax, breathe,” he said softly as he worked over Mav’s shoulder blades, down his back and up again.
Maverick really wanted to say that this was not what he’d had in mind, but Ice’s touch was magic. Where had he learned that? There was pressure near his spine and neck and Maverick felt it tingle down to his legs. He could only exhale and melt into the duvet.
“Tell me if it hurts or …”
“Ugh,” was all Maverick could say as Ice covered his back with broad, confident strokes. He felt some pressure in his ribs as he lay on them, but what Ice was doing to his back made him want to live in this moment forever.
Maverick had never thought of his shoulders as a particularly sensitive place, but as Ice worked at the spot beneath his neck, he felt like he could float away in a haze of pure relaxed pleasure. It wasn’t necessarily sexual but it flooded him with quiet bliss. His entire being seemed to narrow down to the points where Ice was touching him. Every other touch sent pleasant shivers down his spine.
He was so lost in the sensation he hardly noticed when Ice moved to his arms and started to caress every muscle down to his fingertips which he kissed each before moving back. And to the other arm. Time seemed to slow down. He forgot everything that wasn’t Tom’s hands on him.
Ice never asked him to move, just checked in every now and then with, a kiss and a “Love you so much,” a caress and “Are you still good?” and Maverick could just grunt in reply as his world had come to a stop and a part of him wished that Ice would never stop.
“Yeah,” Mav choked off a reply to the latest question as he tried to rise up and dropped his head back down. He wanted to touch Ice back, to move, but the entire experience had left him a little dizzy. Not in a bad way, but still … the world swirled when he moved.
“Shh, give it a moment,” Ice soothed, laying next to Maverick, a broad gentle stroke across his back. “Take it easy, your blood pressure likely changed” he said as he laid another kiss on Mav’s temple. “The doctor said a massage would help with recovery.”
“Mhm.”
“Do you need some water?” a hint of concern in Ice’s voice and frown that formed between his eyebrows. He’d taken lessons and tips from a physical therapist, so he was fairly sure he was doing everything correctly, but this was Maverick. He couldn’t help but worry. He moved to check Pete’s pulse.
“No, no, I’m good,” Maverick tried and managed to push his elbows beneath him and Ice’s hand away from his throat. “It’s just…” Wow.
“Do you want me to stop?” Ice was serious.
Maverick rolled his eyes. “Kazansky, kiss me and stop asking stupid questions.”
“As my very distinguished captain orders,” Ice murmured, his eyes sparkling, enjoying the way Mav moved now – free of tension, peaceful. Languid in his arms. He kissed Pete, his touch reverent across his lover’s body – ever conscious of what caused a soft moan of pleasure and which spot made Pete just a tad more tense.
“You were always good at following orders,” Maverick laughed in between kissing as he regained enough of his bearings to try and climb on Ice.
Ice went easy, falling on his back, pulling Maverick on top of him. “And you were always terrible,” he replied, his hands moving along his Mav’s sides, sliding beneath the waistband of the jeans. With a flat, possessive touch he squeezed his lover’s ass. “I’m not done yet.”
“I should hope not,” Maverick huffed a laughter, his body heavy and pliant against Ice.
Tom shook his head, laughter teasing the edges of his smile.
And Maverick marveled, because while he could read his wingman like a book even when Ice stood still – this… openness was an entirely new side. He found he liked it. Treasured even. He sneaked another kiss before he gathered enough sense and momentum to rise to his knees. He had to get those jeans off.
But for all Ice’s ministrations when he shot up – the movement and constriction in his muscles caused a sudden streak of pain to cut across his middle that he couldn’t have hidden from his face even if he’d remembered to try. “Shit.”
Ice moved up with him. Hands soft as he went from Maverick’s suddenly pale face to chest, “Breathe. In. Out.”
“Sorry,” he wasn’t sure what he was apologizing for.
Ice laid a kiss on skin nearest to his lips. “You’re still healing.”
“I hate this,” he knew he sounded petulant. Half in pain, his jeans open. His desire squashed, but stubbornness prevailing.
“I don’t,” Ice replied, moving around to get off the bed and help Maverick rise too. “You’re here,” he said. “That’s more than I ever hoped to have.” More than I dared to hope a week ago. For Ice, Death still hovered too close by.
“You’re easy to please,” Maverick grumbled as he rose up to divest himself of those jeans finally. He highly doubted he’d persuade Ice to any more action tonight, but Ice had held him tight every night since Maverick had come home with him and that… That wasn’t half bad either.
Ice snorted, “There’s an entire Navy that would disagree with you.”
“They usually do,” Maverick grinned, some strength back to his smile as the previous flash of hurt faded across his senses. Still, he let Ice herd him under the blankets. “But what do they know.”
“Indeed,” Ice said, his gaze warm, but worried. “Try to relax and I’ll get your meds.”
Maverick rolled his eyes and considered shifting the pillow behind his back, but the renewed stiffness in his middle told him to let it be. “You’re such a good nursemaid,” he teased, trying to get his and Ice’s mind off it. He waited for Ice to leave the room before he shouted, “Did you ever do this for Slider when he was sick?”
“Do not mention Slider when you’re naked in my bed!” Ice screeched back.
Just the tone of that made Maverick smile. Better than any medicine. Job of a wingman well done.