Lovesick Gods

by Amanda Meuwissen

  Not that Mal was holding out for Danny to come over. Kid had ‘family dinner night’ to attend to and had only mentioned offhandedly that he might be able to stop by if things ended early. Mal did not wait by the phone for some pretty young thing to give him the time of day. If he didn’t see Danny tonight, he’d see him tomorrow. After that, the heist might even prove to be a kind of foreplay between them. Danny might enjoy the chance for something normal after all this mess with Ludgate, and Mal didn’t mind providing a challenge that neither of them could win or lose.

  Zeus could still look like a hero saving the security guard from unknown tortures—even if he’d just be passed out on the floor. There could be a win-win in there somewhere as long as Mal still made off with the diamond and didn’t see any jail time. That was part of their deal.

  But that was Monday. Today was Friday, and right now, Mal had no new messages from Danny and nothing else to occupy his time.

  Maybe Big Trouble in Little China. It never failed to amuse Mal when Kurt Russell got knocked out by falling ceiling debris at the start of the final battle and only really contributed at the very end.

  A gust of wind made him shiver.

  Wait. Gust of wind?

  Bolting off the couch, Mal whirled around to take in his apartment. No one. Everything in its place. The door was still closed, but—there. The rug. It was folded up as if someone had just walked over it.

  “Sparky?” Mal called, relaxing marginally, but a little on edge since he couldn’t see Danny and wondered where he could be hiding. Maybe he was feeling coy and had lightning jumped upstairs to undress and wait for Mal on the bed. Mal didn’t care for surprises, but he wouldn’t turn his nose up at a gift like that.

  Nothing save the familiar creaks of his apartment replied, though the tingling sense that something was wrong, that someone was there, he just couldn’t see them, made him slowly circle the sofa while keeping an ever-watchful eye directed outward.

  Another gust of wind. Mal whirled again—still nothing. Hands twitching, he called with more warning, “Sparky, if you’re angling for me to reveal my gear, it’s not gonna happen. Not unless you’re looking for a fight.”

  A faint, eerie giggle responded. “Spoilsport,” Danny’s voice came from behind him, but again, when Mal turned, there was nothing. “I don’t want to fight,” Danny said, yet the tone of his voice seemed to say the opposite, coming from—right in front of Mal, damn it, why couldn’t he see him? “I want to play.”

  Mal was already backing off, scanning every inch he could see, when that gust of wind came right at him and he found himself pinned to the wall beside the stairs.

  He was fine, he was fine, he was fine. But his first instinct was to react with ice, rush forward, attack—or face the consequences.

  No. This was Danny. Danny wasn’t holding him too tightly; he hadn’t slammed Mal back too hard; he didn’t know this bent the rules in ways that made Mal’s stomach twist. How could he?

  Their initial encounters were made up of Mal grinning at him as they traded blows. But that was different. That was theatrics. That was planned and prepared for and expected. When Mal was safe in his home with someone he should have been able to trust, he couldn’t… He had to keep it separate. Otherwise, he’d turn this into a real fight or panic, and he couldn’t allow either.

  But where was Danny? Mal could feel him, the kid’s gloved hands on his shoulders, his breath against Mal’s face, but he couldn’t see anything.

  “Like the new suit?” All at once, the image before Mal rippled, revealing a body in black that he might not have recognized as Danny if not for the voice. Then came his mouth as he pulled up the mask just enough to free his lips.

  Danny descended and Mal tensed. His brain was still playing catch-up. He wanted to fight back or at least take a moment to breathe, to really see Danny so he could shrug off the tightness in his limbs that wasn’t going away. He tried to turn his head out of the kiss, but Danny was too strong, pressing him into the wall and delving into his mouth with a possessive tongue. Mal trembled—and not in the way he enjoyed trembling at Danny’s touch.

  Breath catching, his hands grew colder as Danny held him in place. Mal felt helpless and he…he couldn’t be helpless like this, not like this.

  Danny pulled back just as the panic started to ratchet up higher. “Got called in to try this baby out. Figured I’d share the spoils with you and have a little fun. Race you to the bedroom,” he whispered, and in a blink, he was gone again—black mask back in place, invisible.

  Hugging the wall to ground him, Mal moved away from the stairs and kept his eyes peeled for another telling ripple. “Danny?” he called, demanding of himself that his voice be firm, not shaking, not betraying the bile and fear in his throat. Malcolm Cho was not afraid—he was never afraid, not anymore. He needed to shed this feeling of being powerless. It was just Danny. It was just Danny. “Not my kinda game, kid! Take off that mask and I can show you a much better—”

  “Oh, no. It’s my turn again,” Danny’s voice startled Mal from behind, and then he felt hands loop around his waist. He shivered again. He needed to relax. He’d enjoyed this kind of power play with Danny before; he just wished he could see him. “I’ll make it good for you, Cho. You know I will.”

  Mal, Mal wanted to correct him, but Danny always fell to old habits when he wasn’t thinking. And if he wasn’t thinking, then he wasn’t listening. That darkness in him; Mal had never been afraid of it, but seeing Danny in a sleek black suit seemed to personify those shadows behind his eyes, like armor he’d accepted as his skin.

  Still shaking, feeling the chill building in the pit of his stomach, Mal tried to calm his nerves. He brought his hands up to cover Danny’s, reminding himself that he liked the way this body felt pressed up against him, he did. “Whatever you want, Sparky. Just let me—”

  Free-falling, rollercoaster ride, gut-wrenching propulsion, and Mal was upstairs on the bed, an invisible body crawling over him, holding him down.

  It wasn’t like his nightmares. It wasn’t like his nightmares.

  “Danny—”

  “Maybe I’ll keep the suit on for a while. Take you apart just. Like. This.”

  No. Mal felt the ice fighting to escape his palms. All he could see above him was the ceiling and the skyline of Olympus City, but he could feel the weight straddling him, the hands pinning him to the bed.

  “Better than a blindfold, right?”

  No, no, no.

  The rough hands on him were almost like skin, but Mal knew it was the suit. One pushed up beneath his long-sleeved T-shirt, dragging across his stomach and chest, making his gut clench, while the other hand pawed at the button of his jeans.

  Danny’s touch was good. Danny’s touch made him feel alive. Danny’s touch was not like the touches Mal had been running from his entire life, that made his iron-clad control falter and risked turning his entire apartment into a freezer.

  He couldn’t let his powers take over like that, couldn’t let his control slip, wouldn’t be like his father.

  “Danny, listen to—”

  Danny flipped him over so fast, Mal’s head spun. His shirt was hiked up as Danny started to pull his jeans down. His face pressed into the pillow, hands grasping for purchase, and he just…he couldn’t, he couldn’t.

  “Stop,” he croaked, frost bleeding out of his hands onto the sheets. Pulling his knees up beneath him, he tried to shift away from Danny as the kid yanked the jeans down his hips. “Danny, stop,” he said louder, struggling to get away, elbowing Danny back, because he wasn’t listening and Mal couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t breathe. “Danny, stop!”

  Ice erupted from his hands and shot up his arms, coating him almost to his shoulders. His bed became a frozen ruin beneath him as he fought tooth and nail to get away, not seeing, or thinking, or fully aware of anything until the unwanted presence of the bod
y behind him was gone. Scrambling off the bed onto his hands and knees, he gasped into the carpet.

  Mal didn’t remember the last time it had been this bad. He didn’t get like this anymore. He was always in control, always with an edge to him that would cut anyone who tried to bring him low. But he trusted Danny. Felt safe in his home like he did in few other places. And occasionally, too often with both Danny and the comfort of his home, he let his guard down, and that had its hazards. It opened him up to too many old feelings of being trapped by a man who should have been the person he turned to when he was scared.

  A battle was one thing, but nobody hurt Mal like this anymore. Nobody had power over him. Nobody—

  “Mal…?” Danny’s voice was close beside him on the floor. Mal glanced aside and saw the black of Danny’s leg, the suit made visible again. “I thought you’d like it, like before. Are you…are you shaking?” A black-gloved hand came into view and Mal flinched.

  “Don’t. I’m fine.”

  “Mal, you’re not—”

  “You were holding me down,” Mal spat, still hunched over, staring through his arms at his jeans trapped around his thighs. He wanted to pull them up but he couldn’t move. His voice shook when he spoke. “You c-can’t…do that.” Fuck.

  Danny’s voice came softer. “Okay.”

  “I couldn’t see you.”

  “Okay. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…I wasn’t trying to—”

  “I know, Danny.” Mal did. Of course he did. That wasn’t like Danny. He wasn’t harsh and brutal. Dark and angry sometimes, alluringly rough in all the right ways, but he hadn’t meant to scare Mal.

  Now Danny knew Mal could be scared. Knew he was broken too, when no one outside of Lucy and Dom was ever supposed to know that the right combination of events or words or touch could spiral Mal right back to being twelve years old. Even with his father long dead.

  Focusing on slowing his breathing, Mal kept his eyes open but stared at the pattern of his jeans. The varying shades of blue stripes in his underwear. The hairs on his legs. Breathe. Just breathe. Stop shaking.

  Slowly, the ice started to recede down his arms. When it was just his hands that remained coated, he sat back, weight on his hip, and willed the frost to dissipate completely. Unfortunately, that wouldn’t save his bed. It misted behind him, completely covered. Danny was lucky he hadn’t suffered the same fate.

  Shoulders sagging, easing out of their tension, Mal looked forward at his bathroom door. He was fine, he was fine, he was fine.

  Several minutes passed before Danny’s tentative voice called out, “Should I go?”

  If it had been anyone else, Mal would have thrown them out by now, turned his panic into rage and directed it at them. But when he saw Danny shift on his feet out of the corner of his eye, he knew that the last thing he wanted was to be alone.

  Mal peered up at Danny standing there uncertain and small. The black mask was in his hands, cowl hair sticking up every which direction, mouth turned into a frown as he stared at the floor and then started to head for the stairs.

  “No.” Mal grasped his wrist. “Come here. Let me get that suit off you. Then you can make this up to me.”

  The mask was in the hand Mal had caught, and it fell from Danny’s fingers as he turned back to him. Their eyes met. Mal was thankful his own were dry, but Danny’s looked watery and racked with guilt for more than what had happened tonight.

  This was Danny. Mal had nothing to be afraid of, but he still feared something at the edge of whatever this was between them. He didn’t fear Danny the way he sometimes feared his past, the way he’d feared his father’s fists and ice cutting into his skin; he feared wanting something he didn’t deserve. Why did Danny insist on showing him something beautiful that could never be his, something that for once, he couldn’t steal?

  But maybe he could borrow it. Maybe he could hold this—hold Danny—for just a little longer and pretend.

  “Come here,” Mal said again and tugged Danny down. Sitting back, he opened his legs to encourage Danny to climb on. Even in the black suit, seeing Danny fully didn’t rekindle any of that panic. Mal needed control to feel safe and sane again, but he had it. He had it even beneath Danny’s weight straddling his hips and settling onto his lap on the floor.

  Unzipping the suit from neck to navel, Mal pushed the edge of fabric from Danny’s left shoulder and felt that warm, smooth skin. Danny shivered in his grasp.

  They reached for each other, and the kiss was desperate, for different reasons for both of them. Mal didn’t know Danny’s reasons, but he could feel the gnawing hunger in the way Danny clung to him with strong fingers curled in his shirt.

  They hungered for each other when they were most damaged. That was new to Mal, something he’d never experienced with anyone else. When he was damaged, he wanted no one around to see it. But now, he wanted Danny to remain right where he was, and he knew that against all odds, Danny sought out him instead of his friends.

  Something must have happened again. Something always happened to send Danny running here. Without a catalyst, would Danny still want him? Mal doubted it. He doubted anyone could want him without getting something in return. But quid pro quo—that’s how the world worked. That’s how Mal’s world always worked. And that was okay if he got to have Danny.

  Mal pushed the suit from Danny’s other shoulder, trapping his arms until he fought to pull them free from the sleeves and returned to wrap bare limbs around Mal’s neck. His chest and back were burning hot from the suit. It felt invigorating against Mal’s skin, still chilled from releasing his ice. He needed a sense of control back, and he had it here with Danny’s raw power under his palms.

  Spinning them, Mal sent Danny tumbling to the floor and shifted until they were laid out with Danny spread beneath him, bare-chested with the suit on only from the waist down. Mal wedged a knee between Danny’s legs to wriggle closer, but for all the want and wildness in Danny’s eyes, there was a deep sorrow Mal found there that stung him.

  He paused. He didn’t want to command Danny. Not anymore than he wanted to be commanded. Danny could have overpowered him. He wasn’t harsh and brutal, no, but he could be. He could be a nightmare so easily. But there he lay, just wanting to be touched and adored and lo…

  Mal was getting lost in Danny, dangerously lost, caught in the labyrinth, no way out. And that should have bothered him. It should have terrified him.

  “Something happened,” Mal said, reaching for Danny’s face.

  A hand came up to grasp his wrist as if Danny might push him away, but he just held Mal’s fingers there, gently, unsure. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Danny—”

  “Not this time. Okay? I just want you to touch me.” Pulling Mal’s hand down, Danny trailed it along his neck and down the center of his chest. “I want to forget. Please. Help me forget for a little while.”

  Mal stared at his hand being dragged lower and lower down Danny’s stomach. “Forget what?”

  “Everything. Just for a while. Please. You always take care of me.” He grinned, and it was half forced, half honest with fond amusement. “They might even revoke your villain card if you’re not careful.”

  “Never,” Mal smiled back at him as Danny brought his hand to the edge of the suit. “I’ve racked up quite a few points over the years to hold my position indefinitely.” Splaying his fingers low on Danny’s belly, he turned his hand so that it slid within the strange black fabric.

  Danny bucked up as if to will Mal to reach in further, so Mal let his fingers sink deeper inside the suit. “Wait,” Danny said, even as his neck arched at Mal’s fingertips grazing him. “Wait, I…I want you to touch me, I do…but maybe it should be my turn to take care of you.”

  “Oh? And what would you do for me, Sparky?” Mal whispered.

  Grasping Mal around the shoulders, Danny rolled them, reversing the
ir positions and dislodging Mal’s hand almost at lightning speed. Mal took a moment to blink up at him and get his bearings, and his pause caused the grin on Danny’s face to falter.

  He pulled up. “I’m not trying to hold you down.”

  Mal’s own smile grew strained. He was fine now. He didn’t mind Danny being rough when he was ready for it. “Just need to know what I’m in for. What do you want, Danny? What do you want to do for me?”

  Planting his knees on either side of Mal’s hips, Danny scooted down so he could pull the tangled jeans the rest of the way off. He returned for the T-shirt, and old anxiety coiled in Mal’s gut, but he pushed it aside. Danny knew, he’d seen, it was okay. So even though Mal was tense, he let Danny remove him of his shirt, leaving him in just his underwear.

  The worst of the scars were on his chest and back, where it was easiest to hide them from curious teachers or neighbors. A few were from things other than his father, but most… Most were his handiwork.

  Danny tugged only lightly on Mal’s shorts, just enough to reveal his hips. There was a particularly jagged scar on the left side in the dip of the bone. Danny kissed it. Licked it. Sucked…

  Moaning, Mal bucked up, feeling the edge of his ice stir to the surface again, but not like it had when he froze the bed. This version was different.

  His scar tissue had almost no feeling, but the skin around it was hypersensitive. Usually, Mal hated that about his scars because he didn’t want to remember they were there. He kept them covered, hidden, untouched. But Danny…he went right for them like he treasured every inch of puckered skin.

  “They’re not ugly,” Danny said, licking one on Mal’s stomach, before moving to a smaller scar on his ribs. “You don’t have to hide them. Not from me. I want to kiss and tease them until they’re your favorite thing for me to touch.”

  Mal snorted but then gasped when Danny moved from sucking on one scar to his nipple, then to another scar that he grazed with his teeth. “I doubt they would ever be my favorite thing,” he said as he ground his hips up.