The characters are all the property of Sanami Matoh. Thanks go to the illustrious Jenny Penny for a marvelous beta job, without whom this little romp wouldn't be nearly as good. The theme song of this story is "Bitch" by Pigface.

Hate
by Maya Tawi

2004

"Don't wanna love the hate
But the sex is great"
--Pigface

It was the longest I'd ever gone without sex.

Well, no, that's not entirely true; there was that whole period between birth and age fifteen that was pretty sex-free for me, and hey, I have no complaints about it. But ever since then I've never had to do without.

The galling part was that, technically, I didn't have to go without. I mean, I'm still pretty, and thank Christ for that. But falling in love makes a guy do crazy things, like swear off the touch of anyone who's not his One True Beloved.

For example.

Okay, so I was never very good at thinking things through.

I'm a pretty sanguine guy. I'm laid back. I take things in stride. So if I wake up one morning and realize I'm in love with my partner, the light of my life, my favorite bit of scenery, my choice target for molestation-- well, I'm comfortable with that. This self-imposed sexile, on the other hand... that was another matter entirely.

It made sense at the time. I mean, it still does. Ryo's skittish to begin with, and we have yet to progress past the occasional ill-timed mack; he's overly jealous and he's got intimacy issues out the ass, and because he's Ryo, he pulls off the contradiction with style, or at least with a certain amount of ingenuous charm. So obviously the only way to get him into the sack is to remain patient and faithful and prove he's the only one I want to get my paws on.

Well, it looked good on paper.

I certainly didn't plan to find myself rapidly approaching the one-year celibacy mark-- one friggin' year since the last time I, Dee Laytner, danced the horizontal tango. One whole year without saucy broads and eager men and soft curves and deft fingers and bodacious bods....

Fuck. Or, more to the point, the lack thereof. I couldn't stop thinking about it.

I didn't go out that night with the intention of getting laid; I just wanted to flirt a bit, take the edge off. Dally with some dude I'd never see again, then go home and jerk off. Really, when you think about it, it was about as disloyal as watching porn.

Unfortunately, the best-laid plans were shot all to hell the second I walked into my favorite bar and saw Commissioner Berkeley Rose.

Berkeley Rose, royal pain in my ass, wishes he were a pain in Ryo's. When your boss has a hard-on for your lust object, he's got a million ways of making your life hell, and short of actually splitting us up Berkeley has used all of them. And now here he was, defiling my bar. I didn't think; I strode up to him and demanded, "What are you doing here?"

He turned, his initial look of dismay quickly replaced by a superior eyebrow lift. "I could ask you the same thing."

"I'm always here. This is my bar."

"Then how come I'm here almost every night and I never see you?"

I hesitated, caught off-guard by the inescapable logic. Berkeley had moved to the city after I'd met Ryo, and thus after I'd sworn off the allure of strange men (the stranger, the better). He could very well have become a regular at my bar during that time.

I didn't like logic.

I plopped onto the stool next to him, ignoring his obvious consternation. "Nice hangout for a commissioner of the NYPD. Your superiors know what you do in your free time?"

"What about you, Detective Laytner? Are your colleagues aware of your... proclivities?"

"My colleagues don't give a damn about my proclivities." But I felt uneasy. Apart from Ryo and J.J., no one else at the twenty-seventh knew, at least not in so many words. I got the feeling that they suspected but they didn't want to hear it out loud, and I wasn't eager to enlighten them. They're my buds, but still. You hear horror stories about what happens when cops find out one of their own is gay-- or bi, even. Suddenly I regretted raising the subject.

Berkeley gave me a triumphant look, like he was reading my mind or something. I glared at him, calculating how to regain the upper hand.

The bartender appeared as I was pondering and nodded at Berkeley. "The usual?"

"Please," he said, and a glass of something dark and probably expensive materialized in front of him. Now that hurt. I'd been coming here for years and the barkeep had never bothered to learn my favorite.

"Jack. Rocks," I said, and flashed a grin. "You know, the usual."

The bartender was unimpressed. I scowled at Berkeley as he moved off. I can hold my liquor, I have witnesses, that thing with Ryo and the wine was just a fluke, and anyway, there was no way Berkeley could have known about it, and absolutely no reason for him to be smirking like that. Then again, Berkeley Rose never really needed an excuse to smirk.

My drink came and I sipped at it slowly, my mind racing. I had no idea what to do next. I couldn't leave, because then Berkeley would have chased me out of my own bar; I couldn't flirt with anyone, because he'd be watching like a hawk for any indiscretions he could report back to Ryo.

So I drank. And seethed. And, on my second glass, lit up a smoke.

Berkeley wrinkled his nose at me. "That's a filthy habit."

I exhaled into his face, and he recoiled. "Oh please, lecture me some more. I've never heard it before."

His lip curled. "I can't wait until that's outlawed."

"Yeah, and then we can outlaw drinking and sex and everything else that's fun. What's your point?"

"You're exposing me and everyone else here to harmful carcinogens."

"So leave. No one's making you stay."

He didn't leave, and I felt a surge of annoyance. What would it take to get him out of my bar?

I smoked steadily through the next few drinks. No one approached me, and I wasn't sure if it was due to my palpable black mood or to Berkeley's smug presence at my side, too close to comfort. The thought of anyone assuming we were an item made my skin itch.

With no other distractions, I wallowed in my own resentment for a while, until I glanced over and saw Berkeley chatting up a young blond thing to his left. My irritation quickly grew to outrage. He was supposed to be fixated on Ryo, so what the hell was he doing flirting with other men on his off hours? I mean, sure, I'd been planning on doing the same thing, but at least I had an excuse. He hadn't spent the past eleven months, two weeks, and three days pursuing the unattainable.

I was pretty close to seeing double at that point, or I might have just kept ignoring him. Then again, drunk or sober, I was never very good at leaving well enough alone.

Standing turned out to be a mistake; I staggered as I slid off the stool, and my head spun. I was further gone than I'd realized, but I wasn't about to let that stop me. Berkeley laid a hand on his young thing's arm and gave me a disgruntled look that suffered a bit from its lack of focus. He'd been drinking as much as I had, and he must've been pretty buzzed at that point as well, because he didn't resist very much as I grabbed his arm and hauled him off his stool, pulling him into the bathroom. He didn't protest at all when I shoved him into a stall and slammed him against the wall.

I stuck my face inches from his, bracing my hand on the wall beside him for balance, and demanded, "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

He still looked smug and superior, damn him. Even drunk and manhandled, Berkeley never lost his cool. "I was enjoying myself, until you got involved."

"Macking on random guys out of one side of your mouth and chasing Ryo with the other!"

He gave me a look. I slapped the wall in frustration. "You know what I mean!"

"He's not a virginal maiden you have to woo with flowers and candy. Jesus, no wonder you haven't gotten anywhere--"

"Shut up!"

"Truth hurts," he said with a sneer.

I bared my teeth. "You're treading a mighty fine line, Commissioner. Two words, sounds like sexual harassment?"

The brief flicker of unease that crossed his face gladdened my heart, but it was quickly replaced by a familiar smirk. "Ryo's a big boy. He's capable of saying no if he wants."

"I'd say a punch in the face is a pretty strong no."

"Some would consider it foreplay," Berkeley purred.

I leaned forward, curling my hand into a fist. "Wanna find out?"

I honestly didn't intend for that to sound as suggestive as it did. But the flare of heat in Berkeley's fever-bright eyes was unmistakable, and I felt an answering surge somewhere below my already alcohol-warmed belly.

Well, shit.

We were both drunk. We were both off-balance. I suppose I could say that I accidentally tripped and landed on his face, but either way I found myself pressing him against the wall and kissing the life out of him. And I've never been very good at lying to myself.

For a moment I was content to just close my eyes and relax into the familiar sensations: the warm body beneath my hands, the wet lips responding enthusiastically, the tongue pushing against mine--

Berkeley. Not Ryo, Berkeley. Fuck.

I jerked back as though I'd been stung. Berkeley's eyes glittered behind his glasses, somehow dazed and arrogant at the same time. "I hate you," I panted, trying to pull away.

He licked his lips. "I could say the same."

"You're an arrogant jackass--"

"And you're an unprincipled slut."

The hell? I'd been the very model of fucking fidelity. Where did he get off? "I'm unprincipled? Who's the one who keeps hitting on his employees?"

"Oh, shut up," he said, and kissed me again.

Now, I'm a good kisser; I have it on no less authority than Ryo himself, and after all, I've had plenty of practice. I would even go so far as to call myself skilled.

Berkeley's kiss blew me away.

There was nothing romantic or gentle about it. He devoured my mouth, forcing his tongue past my lips, and when my knees turned to jelly he grabbed me and pushed me back against the opposite wall. My head bounced off it and I saw stars. I reached out-- to steady myself, or so I thought-- and found my hands clutching at the broad planes of his back. Baser instincts took over. I'd gotten his shirt half-unbuttoned before my brain caught up with my dick.

I felt sick, the six or seven Jacks sitting uneasily in my stomach. I also felt incredibly turned on, and impulse control has never been my forte.

"Wait," I gasped, trying to pull away. His mouth followed mine, relentless. "Wait-- wait! We can't--"

Berkeley paused in his explorations and demanded, "Are you fucking Ryo?"

"Not yet, but--"

"Then we can."

He punctuated this assertion with another trouser-scorching kiss. Coherent thought was becoming increasingly difficult. In my defense, did I mention it had been nearly a year?

We passed a few sweaty minutes pawing at each other in the confines of the stall, and the little voice of my conscience grew increasingly amenable with each wayward grope, going from this is so wrong to this is so fucked up to this is... not so bad, actually, finally stalling somewhere around who the fuck am I kidding, I'm ripping his clothes off in a public restroom-- this is fucking hot.

My conscience has always had a rather flexible outlook on life.

The second time I nearly tripped over the toilet, Berkeley caught me and whispered in my ear, "I live just around the corner."

Of course he did. And he called me a slut.

The hot, damp puff of his breath was distracting, and it took me a moment to realize the full import of what he was saying. I hesitated, all too aware of the hard press of his body against mine, the persistent throb of my cock. The alternative was to go home now and whack off to my usual fantasy of Ryo, the one where he has that scary look he gets right before he blows something up. The alternative didn't hold its usual allure at the moment, not when I was face-to-face-- and other parts-- with a real, flesh-and-blood offer of sex.

I wet my lips and said, "Okay."

I did feel guilty, don't get me wrong. I'm not completely heartless. The guilt just evaporated as soon as I felt Berkeley Rose trailing his tongue down my throat.

Is it news to anyone that I'm led around by my dick?

We tried to rearrange each other's clothing into some semblance of propriety, and it was like being back in high school again, trying to hide the evidence of our hijinks from the grown-ups. I tucked in my shirt with unsteady hands, and Berkeley's eyes flashed behind his glasses.

"Let's go," he growled, turning away.

Berkeley stalked through the crowded bar, leaving me to hurry along in his wake, and you better believe I was walking bowlegged. I was also glaring daggers at the back of his head, because Dee Laytner is nobody's fucking lapdog, except for maybe Ryo's, but I was too drunk and too turned on and, let's face it, too freaking stupid to back down now. Somewhere in the back of my mind, the distant voice of sanity was screaming bloody murder. The distant voice of sanity never stood a friggin' chance. Holy Mary, I was about to get laid.

He stopped long enough to tell the bartender to put our drinks on his tab, which was just one more reason to hate him. They never let me run a tab.

I don't remember much about the walk to his building, just that it was mercifully short. Then we were inside and I was shoving him against the wall of the elevator, and not too much later he was shoving me against the wall outside his apartment. I pushed him away and disentangled my mouth long enough to grind out, "Open the damn door."

Berkeley gave me a Look and pulled back long enough to fit his key in the lock and, hey, double entendre. I leaned back against the wall and breathed deeply, trying to get a hold of myself. This was it. My last chance to back out, forget the whole thing and not fuck my boss who I didn't even like. Go home, put it out of my mind, and concentrate on wooing Ryo.

"Wooing". God, I hated that word.

I opened my mouth, steeling myself to walk away, and nearly toppled over as Berkeley grabbed my suit jacket and hauled me inside his apartment. He closed the door with my back and proceeded to put my still-gaping mouth to good use. I was dimly aware of the snick of the deadbolt sliding home.

Well, so much for good intentions.

I fisted my hands in his shirt and concentrated on demonstrating every last bit of my hard-won skills. When he pulled back for air, I said, more breathlessly than I'd intended, "And here I thought I wasn't your type."

"You're not," he retorted, wrestling my jacket off my shoulder.

I ground my hips against his and grinned. "The evidence suggests otherwise."

"I'm slumming," he said, and silenced my protest with his tongue.

Of course I couldn't just let it go at that. I grabbed his ass and squeezed, and when he jerked away, I needled, "Don't tell me you've been after my ass this whole time."

I nipped none-too-gently at his ear, and his fingers tightened on the body part in question. "You flatter yourself."

"Yeah, right."

I slid my hands under his shirt and was rewarded with a stinging slap. "You," he growled, "are wearing far too many clothes."

"Man, of all the tired, overused clichés--"

He grabbed the front of my shirt and yanked, sending the buttons flying. I yelped. "That was a good shirt!"

"'Was' being the operative word," Berkeley said. My ruined shirt went the way of my jacket. Before I could object any further he undid the front of my pants and pulled them down, spinning me around to press my face and now-exposed dick against the door.

As I reeled from the change in position, a shoe poked at the tangle of fabric around my ankles. "Nice boxers."

"Shut up." I spread my hands against the door and squirmed against him, equal parts alarmed and aroused, wondering if he was planning to fuck me here, like this, bareback and dry. Not that I'd let him, of course, but just the idea....

"Look at you," he murmured in my ear. His shirt and trousers chafed my skin. "You want it. You're begging me for it. You're so turned on you're practically humping the wall."

"I hate you," I panted, pushing back against him.

"Say it like you mean it, Detective."

It was like a bucket of ice water, but before I could react he'd grabbed me by the shoulders and was shoving me into a bedroom. I stumbled over my pants, catching myself against the bed, and he pushed me backwards onto it.

"You bastard," I gasped, once I'd found my breath. "You're getting off on this, aren't you?"

He cocked an eyebrow at me. "Isn't that the point?"

"I mean the fact that I work for you, you son of a bitch! That's what this is all about, isn't it? Just another way to fuck me over--"

He effectively cut me off by swallowing my dick.

I yelped again and writhed on the bed, torn between pulling away and pushing deeper into his mouth. The utter fucking bastard. I don't like playing games. I'd just wanted to get laid. I should've known better than to trust Berkeley fucking Rose not to have an ulterior motive.

My internal struggle didn't last very long, and soon I was burying my hands in his hair and holding on for dear life. I've never been ashamed of being loud during sex-- you're having fun, why not tell it to the world?-- but somehow the fact that it was Berkeley Rose hearing those noises made it weirdly humiliating, and if I'd had enough blood in my body my face would've been beet red.

The torture continued for a few minutes, and then I came with a shout, burying myself as deeply as I could and feeling a kind of sadistic glee as Berkeley swallowed around my cock, then pulled back and kept sucking till I was dry. I slumped back on the still-made bed, spent.

A sense of something moving above me was all the warning I got before Berkeley's hands pinned my wrists to the mattress and his mouth descended on mine. It wasn't until my lips parted that I realized he hadn't swallowed everything.

I gagged, clenching my teeth, determined to deny him the victory-- hey, I can play the game too, if I have to-- but he was ruthlessly persistent, and I found myself swallowing my own come. Which wasn't necessarily a new experience for me, but. Berkeley.

Jesus. What the hell had I gotten myself into?

Suddenly I was far too sober to deal with this. I tried to pull away, scrambling up the bed, but he followed, skillfully working my mouth until I found myself relenting again. His hands trailed from my wrists down my arms, tracing burning paths over my body. I wasn't ready to get hard again, but a valiant effort was being made.

Berkeley had shed the rest of his clothes at some point, and his cock rubbed against mine. I wondered if he expected me to suck it. I wondered if I could bring myself to do so without biting it off.

Then the point was rendered moot as he stripped my pants and shoes off in one smooth motion and slung my still-weak legs over his shoulders, pushing them up towards my ears.

"Now wait," I began, wriggling back on my elbows. "Damn it--"

His smile was all teeth. "Don't worry. I have protection. God only knows where you've been."

"You bastard," I said again. "You and your fucking power trips--"

Then his fingers pushed inside me, and I forgot whatever it was I'd been about to say.

He gave me only cursory preparation, gazing down at me the whole time with an unreadable expression on his face. He hadn't taken off his glasses, a fact which struck me as slightly absurd. I squirmed and panted and tried not to beg for more, because. Berkeley.

Then he wrenched his fingers out and shoved his dick in, and I yelled.

I hadn't had sex in a year. I hadn't been fucked in even longer. My ass burned as he pumped, pulling almost all the way out and then slamming back in, and God, oh God, it was incredible. It wasn't long before he found the right spot and I saw stars. I was hard again, a fact which became all too apparent when he grabbed my dick and pulled.

I was whimpering and babbling and Jesus, this was even worse than the blow job because I was begging for his cock, begging him to go deeper, making greedy little sounds that I never, ever thought Commissioner Berkeley Rose would hear. I thought about facing him at work the next morning, about sitting at my desk next to Ryo and feeling my ass ache as I watched him, and I shot my load for the second time that night.

Berkeley kept going even as I struggled to gather my scattered wits. The friction was starting to drive me nuts; my sensitized dick twitched fitfully, and every inch of my skin felt like it was squirming off my bones. Just when I thought I couldn't take anymore, he sped up, grabbing my hips hard enough to bruise, then buried himself one last time and came.

He pulled out slowly, with surprising gentleness, and then peeled off the condom, tied it, and pitched it into what I assumed was a wastebasket. I stared at the stuccoed ceiling. The pleasant haze of orgasm had already faded, and it was quickly being replaced by a gnawing sense of guilt.

Jesus. Ryo.

All I could think was that I'd just fucked my boss and romantic rival and hey, did I mention boss, and in the morning we were both going to be in a shitload of trouble.

Berkeley was apparently thinking along the same lines. He pushed his glasses up his nose, looking pensive.

I began, "Listen--"

"No," Berkeley said.

"Whaddya mean, no?" I propped myself up on my elbows. "No what?"

He narrowed his eyes. "No, we're not going to talk about this. In fact, we'll never mention it again. I won't tell Ryo, you won't tell the review board, and we'll both die happy."

It couldn't be that easy. "Why would I trust you not to tell him?"

Berkeley gave me an annoyed look. "Because you could get me fired, you moron. As I'm sure you well know."

"That's never stopped you before."

"I know Ryo wouldn't rat me out. You, on the other hand, are just enough of a bastard to do it out of sheer spite."

And face the ridicule and not-so-good-natured jokes? I wasn't so sure, but I certainly wasn't going to disabuse him of the notion. "And don't you forget it," I said, and stood with a wince.

Like I said, it'd been a long time.

Berkeley sighed, sounding weary and put-upon. "I suppose you can stay the night."

"Gee, that's tempting. Where the hell are my pants?"

He held them out to me without a word.

I grabbed them out of his hand. "I hate you."

"Ironic, isn't it?"

"Fuck you."

"You missed your chance, Detective Laytner."

I snarled.

He was silent as I pulled my pants on and stepped into my shoes. My shirt and jacket were still by the front door. As I turned to leave the bedroom, he said, "I'll be at a meeting upstate for the next couple of days. I probably won't be into the precinct for another week or two."

So I wouldn't have to see him at work the next day after all. That, at least, was a relief.

"Lock up when you leave," he said.

His apartment was really nice, spacious and elegantly decorated. I hadn't noticed it on my way in. I'd had other things on my mind. The shirt was a total loss; I debated asking Berkeley for a safety pin, but the tattered shreds of my pride prevailed. In the end I just buttoned my jacket over it. The bastard damn well owed me a new dress shirt.

The door slammed behind me like a gunshot.

My apartment wasn't exactly nearby, but I decided to walk it anyway. Anyone who tried to mug me would be in for a nasty surprise, and I was definitely in the mood to shoot someone. To my disappointment, nobody tried.

After Berkeley's high-class digs, my apartment seemed small and tawdry. The message light on my answering machine was blinking, and I pressed play with a distinct sense of trepidation.

It was Ryo, of course. He sounded disappointed, covering as he always did with excessive cheer. "Hey, I thought maybe we could go out tonight. But I guess you're not home. See you at work tomorrow!"

I was an idiot.

I needed a shower, but all I wanted to do was collapse into bed, so I stripped down to my boxers and did just that. After a moment I pulled my boxers off as well and tossed them on the floor.

I fell asleep to images of Ryo's smiling face and disappointed eyes.

"I love to hate you"
--Pigface

Email: mayatawi@populli.net

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