Spoilers: Post "Sweet Revenge", set a little while after "A Good Time." Third in the "Negotiations and Love Songs" series; I may write another, I may not, I'm not sure yet.
Other Info: These guys are so not mine, I can't even get Megos for them. There is m/m sex in this story, and I should preface it (or maybe I shouldn't) by expressing how much I dislike writing sex, especially first-time sex. I'm a masochist, I admit it; if I was sane, I'd write genfic. Feedback is welcome. Songfic now and always; "Hearts and Bones," by Paul Simon, and is used without permission. Not beta'd; all mistakes are mine.

Reggie

   If anyone had asked him, he'd have vehemently denied that it was his own snoring that woke him up. Nor was it the movement of his usual bed-partner; the other side of the bed was empty. He saw from the flickering blue light that the tv was on in the living room, turned down too low to be heard from the bed, but it was a port in a storm he was more than willing to latch on to, under the circumstances.

   He got out of bed and padded over in bare feet, standing there, sleepy and rumpled, until Starsky finally noticed him.

   "Hey, I didn't mean to wake you up," he said, with a frown. "Thought I had it turned down low enough that you wouldn't hear."

   "Mmph," was all Hutch said. He ran his hand through his hair, so that it stuck up even more wildly, and clambered over the back of the couch. He slid in behind Starsky and wrapped one hand with easy possessiveness around his bare stomach. The other plucked the root beer out of Starsky's hand and brought it up to his lips. "What are you watching?" he asked, handing the bottle back.

   "Sophia Loren movie," Starsky said, settling himself a little more comfortably into his modified 'seat.' He rubbed the back of his head against Hutch's ear, making him moan.

   "Anything wrong?" Hutch managed to ask.

   "Nah. Just couldn't sleep. Didn't want to wake you up by tossin' and turnin', so I thought I'd catch the 'late-night monster-movie fest' on channel two. Only, the 'late-night monster-movie fest' turned into 'classics of foreign cinema' when I wasn't lookin'."

   "Too bad."

   "Tell me about it," Starsky sighed. "'Course, I was probably their entire audience, before I started school."

   "Yeah. The ratings probably fell right off, and they had to find a better class of insomniacs."

   "Hey," Starsky protested. Hutch just chuckled at him.

   A few minutes passed in silence before Hutch spoke again. "Uh, Starsk?"

   "Yeah?"

   "You do realize that this is in Italian, right?"

   "No, I didn't," Starsky retorted, rolling his eyes. "It's a classic," he said, and added, to Hutch's raised eyebrow, "and there's nothin' else on."

   "Uh-huh."

   "It ain't like she's that hard to look at, even if I don't know what she's sayin'."

   "That I will agree with."

   "Then or now."

   "She's a pretty good walking advertisement for the benefits of an all-Italian-food diet," Hutch agreed. "And don't say it."

   "Say what?"

   "That you're hungry."

   Starsky grinned. "I wasn't gonna say that."

   "Right."

   "Although now that you mention it, I think there's some leftover pizza in the fridge," Starsky said, and made to get off the couch. Hutch held him back, though, and wouldn't let it move.

   "It's too late to be eating cold pizza."

   "I was gonna warm it up."

   "No," Hutch said, and bit into an earlobe.

   Starsky just chuckled. It was an old routine, but it got the desired result: Hutch was now tonguing the spot where his teeth had sunk in. He tried hard not to shiver from the attention, but it was impossible - especially not with Hutch's hand sliding easy circles over his stomach at the same time.

   Finally, impatient, he half-turned and pushed a startled Hutch over on his back on the couch. "Hi," he said with a grin, before latching on to Hutch's mouth.

   They kissed a long time, tongues waging a war that neither would be that disappointed to concede. This time, Hutch won; soon, Starsky found himself actively fighting to escape his hold, just to take a much-needed breath. When he finally pulled away, Hutch grabbed one of his wrists and twisted the arm around his back to ensure that he didn't go any further than he had to.

   "Whoa, babe," Starsky gasped, trying to catch his breath. "Easy, easy."

   "Sorry," Hutch mumbled, but didn't let him go. Instead, he surged up off the couch until he was in a sitting position, and latched his mouth onto Starsky's neck.

   "God," Starsky moaned. He was rapidly growing dizzy from sheer sensory overload. He knew that he'd have a dark hickey on his neck in the morning from Hutch's possessive mouth, but he didn't care; this Hutch, the hungry wild man, was a recent revelation to him. He wasn't out of control at all, just narrowly focused on getting what he wanted; normally, that focus was directed towards catching a criminal, or righting an injustice. It was what made him so good at what he did.

   Right now, what he wanted was Starsky.

********

********

   Hutch had to let go of Starsky's wrist in order to pull at the knotted drawstring of his pajama bottoms. Released, Starsky fell back, catching himself at the last minute; his arm tingled from loss of circulation, but still managed to hold his weight. When Hutch tugged impatiently at the fabric, he lifted himself up.

   There was no conversation that could cover this; maybe that was the difference between this time and all the others, when they had wrestled on the couch or in the bed without actually taking that last step further, because words had always gotten in the way before. Now, a decision had been made, and Hutch was single-mindedly bringing this act to its inevitable completion. Starsky did nothing, just watched himself stripped bare, saw himself grow hard - no, harder - in his partner's grasp.

   This touch was different from the punishing grasp that had held him close; Hutch's hand, so strong just a moment before, now held him like glass, feeling the weight and heat of his blood-heavy cock. Starsky almost forgot how to breathe, so intent on watching alone; it wasn't until Hutch rubbed a thumb over the head of his cock that he managed to sob out a breath. One of his hands found Hutch's neck, and he grasped him there tightly, fingers lost in silk-soft strands of hair. When Hutch's hand started to move back and forth over him, Starsky closed his eyes, suddenly unable to watch himself being pleasured like this.

   The stroking was tentative at first, as Hutch learned the feel of him. His explorations were rewarded by the heightening of Starsky's response; he moaned and his body trembled in time to the movement of Hutch's hand on his cock. When Hutch leaned forward to kiss him, he whimpered his need into that mouth, a breathless, pleading request that continued when Hutch's tongue moved down over his skin, mapping him.

   He thought he'd come when Hutch unexpectedly bit into a too-sensitive nipple, but Hutch seemed to instinctively sense the danger of that, and his hand tightened over the base of Starsky's cock, preventing him from too soon a release. Starsky tried to concentrate on breathing in and out, but it was difficult to do anything but melt into the couch with Hutch's mouth on his chest, moving from one peaked nipple to the other. Slowly, when he had regained some measure of control, Hutch's hand started to move again, drawing him up into another peak of desire. He wanted to beg, but words were beyond him, and it was unnecessary, anyway; he knew that Hutch would never subject him to more punishment than he could handle, and this - this exquisite, erotic torture was something that he never wanted to end. He could die like this. Death was unthinkable when Hutch untangled his hand from his hair, kissed the palm, and pushed him back onto the couch. He opened his eyes and found Hutch watching him with an expression he'd never seen before, and then he understood - this was a revelation to him, too. He shivered, even as the heat spread further throughout his body; Hutch wasn't touching him anywhere but his cock, but that was suddenly everything, the focus and center of both of their attention. Starsky raised himself onto his elbows and watched himself come, watched the first spurts of come shoot from his body and land on Hutch's chest, the rest dripping down his broad hand. And then there was nothing; nothing, except for harsh breath and a blue flickering light all around them, and Hutch's wet, sticky hand that would not ever let him go. Starsky collapsed back into the couch and tried to remember who he was, and where he was, and what had just happened.

   When he opened his eyes again, Hutch was watching him like he'd never seen him before. He knew the expression on his own face had to be something similar - fear mingled with almost painful tenderness. He touched the spot of come on Hutch's chest with his fingertips and brought it to his mouth, tasting the sharp salty taste of himself, mingled with the sweat of his partner. That done, he reached for Hutch's hand, and slowly, thoroughly licked it clean.

   Hutch was still too far away; Starsky found that he had to physically pull him close, draw him into an embrace, in order to really feel him. His boneless weight was both crushing and welcome, and they lay there together, silent, waiting.

********

********

   It took a long time for either one of them to move, or speak. Hutch seemed to finally realize that he was lying flat on his partner and moved away, too quickly for Starsky to stop him.

   Starsky leaned on an elbow and watched him war with himself, very aware of his own nakedness.

   "Starsk - " Hutch started, finally, with a faltering voice, and Starsky found that he had to kiss him, very hard. "No," he said, when he allowed it to stop. "No."

   Hutch just nodded, still processing.

   Starsky watched blue-tinged shadows move over him like waves, bringing his features into intermittent focus. "I love you," he said.

   "I know."

   "Yeah?"

   "Yes," Hutch said, firmly. "I just didn't expect - "

   "What? That I'd want it so bad?"

   "That you'd want this," Hutch said.

   "I do," Starsky answered, puzzled, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I don't know how else to prove it to you, babe."

   "No," Hutch said, shaking his head, frustrated by the fact that there weren't words that could convey what he meant. As it turned out, he didn't need them. "That you'd want this."

   Starsky's eyes visibly softened as he realized what Hutch was saying to him. "Yeah," he said, quietly. He placed his hands on Hutch's stomach, gently, and repeated, "Yeah, I do." They kissed again, aware that the edge was now gone, and the bright, popping sparks of their earlier encounter had burned down to a hotter and more steady fire. "But not here," he added, and stood up, grateful that his legs didn't buckle underneath him. He grasped Hutch's hand, pulled him up off the couch and led him over to the bed. The movie was over, but the television continued to throw flickering shadows over the walls as they moved.

   When Hutch fell backwards onto the bed, Starsky crawled over him, his hands instinctively finding all of those places he'd always known in the abstract, on the level of the unreal. Now, Hutch was deliciously, deliberately real: hot and hard and passively greedy for his partner's touch.

   Starsky made him naked, and quickly found his swollen cock, surprised at the enormity of his own relief to find tangible evidence that he wasn't the only one who wanted this. No, it was more than simple want - what he felt had subsumed want, and was quickly re-defining need, as well. It was becoming something like a necessity to feel this, like air, and that realization was more frightening than anything else, but not enough to make him stop or even want to stop. Not even close.

   He touched his lips to the head of Hutch's cock and heard him howl, but the pounding of his pulse meant that the sound seemed to come from very far away, like somewhere in the past. He opened his mouth to taste all of him and Hutch came, messily and without warning. Starsky surprised himself by taking in more and more of the thick, acrid fluid that filled his mouth and spilled over his lips - not because of or even despite the taste, but simply because it was from Hutch.

   When he finally stopped coming, they were both a mess, sweating and sticky and panting on the crumpled sheets. Starsky lay down on his back and stared up at the ceiling, willing his heart back into his chest. Hutch was on his side, staring at nothing; when he put a hand on Starsky's sweat-slick chest, Starsky's hand covered it, and held.

********

********

   "We should go somewhere."

   Starsky grinned into the fuzzy half-darkness. "Right now? 'Cause I think I'm underdressed for travellin'."

   "No. No. I mean, just - when we have time. We should make time."

   "Okay. Where'll we go, then?"

   "I don't know. Pack up the car and drive down the coast, maybe. When was the last time we took a real vacation?"

   "You're not using this as an excuse to drag me into the woods again, nature boy."

   Hutch smiled. "Perish the thought. I learned my lesson the last time." He turned over on his back. "Nah. I meant, find a hotel somewhere, an empty stretch of beach - " His voice trailed off. "Take some time."

   "It's been a while." Starsky's fingers trailed a pattern over his lover's chest.

   "Too long."

   "Forever," Starsky agreed, and bent his head to replace his fingers with his mouth.

   Hutch's torso surged up from the bed to facilitate the contact; his voice, when he spoke, was strangled with need. "How am I supposed to just get up tomorrow?"

   Starsky didn't let himself be distracted from his intent. "You're not. Tomorrow's your day off. You're s'posed to stay in bed and let me love you."

   "The day after, then. How am I supposed to get up and go to work without a stupid grin on my face? How am I not going to shout at every person I see that you love me?"

   "You could," Starsky shrugged. "I wouldn't mind."

   "Well, that would be an interesting approach to catching the bad guys - shock them into giving up."

   Starsky shrugged. "I dunno about that, partner. Halfa them probably thought we were doin' it already."

   "I don't even want to think about that."

   "We've been livin' together for weeks - for months, if you count my convalescence. I think some people we're close to have probably suspected what we're doin'." Starsky grinned. "Even though we weren't doin' it."

   "Yeah." Hutch frowned. "Why do you think - "

   "It wasn't right," Starsky said. "Don't get me wrong - it woulda been great, but we weren't ready. Yet."

   "And now we are?"

   "Damned if I know. I don't think I know much of anything right now. Although," he added, "I know one or two things I didn't know a couple of hours ago."

   "Yeah?"

   "Uh-huh."

   "Like what, for instance?"

   "Oh, like you're not as ticklish as I thought you were." He dug his fingers into Hutch's side to prove his point, and was immediately rewarded with a shiver instead of a laugh.

   "That all?"

   "You fishin'?" Starsky teased. "Okay - I also know I like how you taste. I like how I taste when I'm lickin' myself off your fingers." He leaned close to Hutch's ear, so his warm breath whispered into his skin. "I like the way you blush when I'm talkin' dirty to you. That enough for you?"

   Swallowing hard, Hutch nodded. "Yeah."

   Starsky looked disappointed. "Too bad. I hadda whole other list."

   "Save it." Hutch pushed Starsky over on his back and straddled him. "I've got other things for you to do with your mouth, besides talk."

   "Oh, yeah?"

   "Yeah."

********

THE END

The sequel to this story is Still Crazy