rhymeswithcannibal | Until we get a real season 4...

Until we get a real season 4...

[Continuing from thread here.]

The weather forecast for Bethany Beach, Maryland said there was a 30% chance of thunderstorms for the next two days, but currently all the weather seemed to be bringing was cloud cover just dense enough to turn the entire sky steel gray.

Hannibal had a spring in his step as he slid out of the passenger side of the rundown pickup truck they'd bought for cash and never transferred out of the original owner's name. They could leave this behind without worrying that it would ever ever track back to them. No breadcrumbs for Uncle Jack at this marina to have him looking at boats that had been docked for a minimum of three years and then recently left.

"It's the farthest slip from the parking lot," he said as he opened the tailgate and reached in to drag a heavy, wheeled cooler out and settle it on the gravel at his feet.

Five months after they'd died at the cliff house, Hannibal had put some effort into changing his appearance. His skin was tanned, his hair was longer and shaggier, his beard was full, but could never be full enough to hide his distinctive cheekbones, and he was wearing jeans, work boots, a heavy fisherman's sweater, and a bandage on his left hand that he ignored as he worked.

"The keys are in a combination lockbox hidden on deck. I engaged a service to come in quarterly to ensure that the boat was aired out and maintained to a functional standard. We shouldn't have to spend too much time getting our house in order before we can leave."

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Will had set his expectations down in the basement. Context was everything, and his bar for Will was exceptionally high in other areas.

"No." He didn't especially feel interrogated when he was being interrogated. Most people asked the wrong questions.

He kept his focus on Will, hoping that this was going in a direction he'd like, enjoying the faint uncertainty to it, relishing the thought of the lips on that glass going elsewhere on his body. "I've seen no reason for my yes to change between then and this hypothetical asking."

He was too old, too controlled, and too recently cut up to immediately spring an erection, but he'd have to have been dead not to feel a thrill of want at the possibility that they were going to take a huge step today.

There was something very satisfyingly mean about leaving that hypothetical invitation hypothetical. The small and cruel part of Will that contemplated doing just that was fleeting and dismissed.

Will straightened from his lean against the counter and settled his gaze on Hannibal's face, "And now I am asking, Hannibal, may I have you for dessert tonight?"

He added the time stamp to assuage his own habit of finding the smallest of loopholes and wordplay to slip into and thus out of his obligation.

Hannibal noted the specificity with a surge of triumph that made it to his face in a flash of a pleased smile. "Yes, Will, you may."

Now he wished that he hadn't chosen a preparation that would take hours of marinating before he could cook. He would wait those hours, he wouldn't stint on preparation or presentation, and he wouldn't rush through eating, but every moment between now and dessert would be a long one.

"Assuming you haven't over exerted yourself after having the brand removed and preparing it... or are in too much pain," He covers the laugh that want to spill out by taking a drink. His eyes do nothing to hide the mirth.

Delayed gratification. Even if the gratification had been on extended delay. The waiting was like anticipatory foreplay. Will, at least, was finding amusement in the situation.

"I'm touched by your concern." He'd rather be touched by Will. "And I will be certain to inform you if I feel that dessert should be deferred."

As if that was going to happen. He'd walked miles through snow, carrying Will's limp body, after having been carted across the ocean, hung upside down like meat, and branded before killing almost every man on Muskrat Farm. He wasn't going to miss out on dessert because of one little procedure.

"We do have time to pass before dinner. Is there anything you'd like to do before then?"

And having been soundly thrashed by Jack. Can't forget that particular detail.

"What are the instructions you would give to a patient who had just had a sizable circle of skin cut off and the wound sewn together?" Will licks the tip of his tongue over his own bottom lip before bringing the glass to his mouth and swallowing the last of the drink.

He set the glass behind him and leaned back against the cabinets again, hands on the countertop. Will could think of a few things they could do to pass the time. None of them that he would do at the moment. "i had nothing in mind. Did you?"

Yes, never forget nearly being murdered by Jack Crawford.

He could think of ways to pass the time that they'd already done together. Especially watching Will's tongue track across his lower lip. A little bite wouldn't be so bad; he wouldn't even draw blood. "I would tell my patient to rest as needed, avoid heavy lifting, maintain a healthy diet, stay hydrated, exercise as tolerated without strain on the excision site, shower after the second day but don't soak, take pain medication as needed, and call the office if you develop purulent discharge or fever."

He stepped in closer to Will, drawn in to his gravity and not fighting it at all. "I'm not tired or hungry and laps in the pool will have to wait. The question becomes whether we pass the time together or apart."

Attaboy, Jack.

Will pulled his shoulders back and raised his chin slightly, giving a thoughtful hum. "Sounds like hauling dead weight goes against your instructions. Are you going to be a good patient, Hannibal?"

He did not straighten as Hannibal stepped closer, but watched with narrowing eyes and dilated pupils. "Together." Reaching out with one hand, Will gently curled his fingers in Hannibal's shirt. "I'm sure we can think of something, between the two of us. Cards. A game of Risk?"

Don't take his side now.

Hannibal's lips twitched when Will's posture turned challenging, pride and humor mingling to warm his expression and his mood. "I will be a model patient, else I will set back both my recovery and my return to proper exercise."

Also his easing into Havana society had been put on hold while he prepared for this procedure. The tissue expander would have noticeably marred the line of his suit, either inviting criticism of his tailoring or questions about the bump, neither of which were acceptable to him.

He took Will's fingers in his shirt as an invitation to come closer. Near enough to imagine he could feel the heat of Will's body, but only just that close, not touching. "You'd have to teach me how to play."

Hannibal didn't play the kind of Risk that came with a game board.

A well deserved beating can be appreciated without changing sides.

Will would have given no comment if Hannibal explained the reasoning for his sabbatical from society as avoiding questions or comments about the marred lines of his suit. His expression would have said enough.

"I can. And it would certainly kill a few hours," Will ran his thumb over the fabric of Hannibal's shirt he was keeping hostage with his fingers. "If there's nothing at all you can think of doing otherwise." He raised his eyebrows, expression guileless.

Yes, that's why they are international fugitives.

Just remember that if a well-deserved beating comes Will's way.

It was a valid reason to avoid raising questions or drawing the wrong kind of attention.

Hannibal had no interest in playing that kind of Risk. His games came with higher stakes or they were just wasting time. Even as an international fugitive, it was worth it.

Will was putting out an effort to be more open, he'd even closed a loophole for himself with his clear indication that dessert was tonight, and Hannibal had noticed. It felt like invitation enough to lean in and press his lips against Will's.

As long as they don't go for the shoulders.

No comment was made on the reasoning, no attempt to invalidate or argue.

Will pressed into that kiss, closed the distance between their bodies to feel the solid heat of Hannibal against him. He opened his mouth, ran his tongue over Hannibal's lower lip to taste him and settled his free hand on Hannibal's hip.

He wasn't just making an effort to be more open, he was attempting to normalize at least this much contact between the two of them. Moods not withstanding, of course, on either side.

Hannibal would prefer no one further scarred Will's face, either.

What mattered just then was exactly that moment and no other. They'd come so far from Italy or Hannibal's kitchen in Baltimore. Every time Will took a step closer to Hannibal and every time Will let Hannibal come closer was worth remembering, worth noting, worth coming back to in future days when they took steps apart instead.

Hannibal raised a hand to cup Will's cheek and dropped the other to his hip. He wanted to touch Will and hold him, but this served a dual purpose of reassuring Will as to where Hannibal's hands were. Any threat to the situation was emotional, not physical, and Hannibal had no designs to cause either kind of harm as he parted his lips to encourage Will to take a deeper taste.

That was a lost cause at this point.

The space between them was not so vast as it once was, and they shifted closer with efforts both small and large. He kept those efforts, those bridging steps, preserved carefully, an antidote to poisonous thoughts that threatened to spread and poison, a charm against the shadowy specters of doubt.

Until he felt the heat of Hannibal's hands pressing against him and warming him through the layers of his clothes, Will's mind hadn't tripped over the gnarled fear reaction that twisted through his mind. He knew what Hannibal was doing and it was working. Will wanted it to work. Even with those shadowy specters of doubt in his mind twisting over instinct and the extinction of it where Hannibal and knives and unseen hands were concerned.

Will took the invitation and chased the taste of Hannibal into his open mouth. He wanted more, but he was contenting himself with less. For now. He didn't want to spoil himself for dessert.

At no point did Hannibal fail to appreciate the beauty of Will's face, even if Will didn't see it himself. He still drew Will with scars and without, but he wouldn't say one was more beautiful to him.

Today was a day for some large steps, acts of trust that would have been unthinkable not so long ago. They built on sand while the tide was out, and some days there were small erosions, but so far what they built outpaced the hungry grasp of past and future. When the seas of change claimed their sandcastle, at least what was washed away would be something they'd built together.

He wanted Will with a kind of honesty that was almost painful. He wanted the taste of scotch in his mouth and the heat of his body. He wanted to see Will's face twisted with pleasure in part because he was curious to see how similar it would be to his memories of Will's expression twisted in pain. He also wanted dessert.

Hannibal also had a strange eye for beauty.

Their sandcastle was something they built together and something they would destroy together. Tides are fated to wash in, to erode, but their lives were not lived or ended at the mercy of fate. Will refused to believe so. And after they left, their castle would be gone, but the truth of it, how it was constructed, some of the rooms, would be laid bare to counteract how others might describe it.

Will wanted to drown Hannibal in his own pleasure, to see the honest echo of it in his face, to force control from his hands and watch how the loss of it shaped his expression. He wanted the gentle passion of mutual pleasure and he wanted to draw blood, though not this time.

Hannibal just didn't let other people's notions of beauty get in the way of his own experience of it.

Their demesnes, recorded and mapped in Polaroids and drawings and recipe cards, dossiers and newspaper clippings. He'd warmed to Will's desire for this record and the trail of bread crumbs it would leave for investigators when they were gone, finding people in city after city who could tell an evolving story of the two men who passed through, leaving hidden wounds behind them.

Will's desire to see him lost and open would be no real surprise. They both wanted the other laid bare, and Hannibal allowed himself little in the way of vulnerability. He wondered if Will was counting on his hedonism to give him that glimpse, trusting that Hannibal wouldn't hold himself back, or was he going to eschew trust in favor of forcing the issue - perhaps by winding him up over the course of hours with kisses and closeness well before... dessert?

It was an idea that he considered on one level of thought as he swayed into Will, and slid his hand along his waistband to rest at the small of his back. He might just meet Will halfway on that.

Hannibal didnt let much get in the way of his own experience of it.

An unadulterated public viewing of their individual and cooperative works, not filtered through the lens of media and the FBI, would span those Polaroids. Not as clear and graphic as a digital image, but honest in the filtered light and careful angles, not watered down by media or law enforcement.

The answer to that question was ‘both’. Will counted on Hannibal immersing himself in unreserved pleasure, wholly and enthusiastically devoted to the experience with nothing held back and nothing left over for masks. Will also wanted to feed eagerness and heighten anticipation, to drive Hannibal’s want higher and deeper, to stoke a fire that would burn through food preparation and dinner without banking to mere embers.

Halfway is a good place to meet and Will wondered if Hannibal was attempting the same thing with the slide of his hand to the small of Will’s back. He countered by shifting his stance to press the edge of his hp against Hannibal’s groin.

Why would he? They're his experiences, not theirs.

If dessert actually included an orgasm in company for the first time in more than four years, Will could have a very reasonable expectation that Hannibal wasn't going to hold much back. He would, however, be extremely disappointed if it turned out to be a one-sided experience.

He was trying, but constrained by the same caution that had gotten them this far with their physical relationship - he would go only as far as Will had already mapped out, and when he took an inch, it really was an inch and not a mile. This, he believed, was why he was there with Will held against his body while his breath caught in his throat at the pressure of Will's deliberate shift in position.

Will had so far treated everything below his waistband as no man's land, giving that first contact far greater weight than it could ever have again.

Will had a few intentions pertaining to what dessert would entail, but he was very realistic in that, while he expected Hannibal to lose control, he also expected that he, himself, might break the self imposed limit of those intentions. He was wholly prepared not to cast blame on Hannibal for any intentions Will crossed.

Will had set the precedents for needing to move slowly and at his discretion. At the wrong time, a misplaced hand, a forward gesture, might be met with, at the least Will’s prickly displeasure and, at worst, the pointed blade of his ire. And it was caution rewarded, the tenuous strands of trust bridging them were bolstered by the respect and care for boundaries shown, had silenced the hesitation in Will’s mind that said but it's Hannibal at the prospect of further intimacy.

The change in position allowed him to angle closer and press into Hannibal his unmistakeable want of him and the unspoken things promised for later. There was calculation to some of his method but behind it the desire was geniuine.

Will and his intentions were inconstant, but they were both trying - Will to be more constant, Hannibal to trust in that effort.

He didn't miss the fact that Will was taking this step when Hannibal was working at diminished capacity. Even if Will forgot his self-imposed limits, he could take some reassurance from Hannibal's condition. That diminished capacity might be partially illusory, but they both needed their illusions now and then.

He exhaled heavily through his nose for the pressure, for what it signaled. He might ache for it later, but he didn't make any effort to avoid the slow build of pressure in his groin. If Will was going to get scared off by an erection, better to get it out of the way now.

He found being constant was difficult with Hannibal. Though at the very least, his being inconstant in this case was in both of their favor.

WIll wasn’t hiding his motives, he knew that Hannibal would see the timing for what it was and if he had a problem with it, Hannibal had a built in excuse to decline Will’s advances. Having accepted those advances, he wanted Hannibal to ache for it. All through the preparation and eating of Hannibal’s excised flesh. He wanted to derail at least one train of Hannibal’s thoughts with anticipation.

He felt the steady press of hardening flesh at his hip and drew back slightly from Hannibal’s mouth to focus on that sensation. He looked to Hannibal’s face. Gaze sharp and focused, Will narrowed his eyes as he arched against Hannibal, then away in one slow and deliberate roll of his hips.

Hannibal would leave aside laying out the design for a drawing of Will in favor of thoughts of Will's bare body against his later. He'd spare another layer of thought to replay this specific moment on a loop, his breath catching as much from the look in Will's eyes as from the friction and downright wanton implication of the action.

He gave Will what he was looking for, making no effort to hide the way his lips parted and his eyelids dropped, the way his hips twitched forward as Will put space between their lower bodies. Then he closed the distance for a hard kiss to make up for the loss of the press of Will's hip against him.

Will would definitely be on his mind every second between now and when he finally slept. Whenever that might be.

His chest against Hannibal's chest, Will felt that hitch of breath as he heard it, watched Hannibal's expression change, sensation bloom on his features, reaction laid bare with no attempt to cover it.Will met that hard kiss with teeth and the press of his body. He caught Hannibal's lower lip between his teeth, pressed eagerly against the long, firm line of Hannibal's body with his own, indulged himself with the want to feel the outline of Hannibal's erection again.

Only Will's fingers clenched in Hannibal's shirt kept them from sliding down to the waistband of Hannibal's pants, rucking his shirt up and sliding his hand underneath to touch skin. If he started that, they would certainly spoil dinner. So if he was going to suffer, Hannibal was going to suffer with him. Will bit down on Hannibal's lower lip, ground his hip against Hannibal's groin.

Funny, Hannibal's train of thought was running on a similar track to Will's. If there was suffering this evening, they'd be doing it together. Hannibal had no intention of pulling away or stopping until Will remembered that stopping was a thing. Not this time.

His fingers tightened on Will's back for the bite, the hand on Will's cheek slipping up into his curls to tangle there and hold him as he leaned into all of it, the bite, the pressure on his groin, the impending frustration. He rolled his hips to control the pressure Will exerted, keeping it firm enough to leave no doubt of the hard line of his cock under his trousers without trespassing from firm to painful.

As much as he'd like to reciprocate, the cant of Will's hips didn't make that feasible, and that couldn't have been accidental. Maybe later Will would forget himself. Maybe later Hannibal could help Will forget himself.

Until we get a real season 4...

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