(no subject)
He dreams Nic dancing in excruciating detail, and when he wakes he wonders about it, wonders if he really remembers it that clearly, or if he had made up some of the details, like the tight, slick material of the shorts Nic had been wearing, and that there had been something glittery on Nic's skin, something that had smelled a little chemically beneath the stronger scent of Nic's sweat, the saltbitter smell of exertion and alcohol recycled through pores.
Had Nic been wearing a collar and a leash? He doesn't remember if he had, in reality, but according to the dream, yes, he had.
According to the dream, Bill had been able to feel it slithering against his chest, moving with Nic's movement, and he had been aware of it like he'd been aware of the pulse in Nic's thigh, as something peripheral but somehow very much present, like the drone of the bass on the balcony and the smell of the red wine Nic had dipped his finger into.
He rubs at his bare chest with the heel of his palm, and he has no illusions about why. He's rubbing away some kind of twisted sense-memory.
He pushes up onto one elbow, shaking his head (like that might somehow erase the dream-memory currently occupying his brain, as though Bill's brain worked on the same principle as an Etch-A-Sketch, but he knows it won't work; it would take lye soap or maybe industrial strength acid to eradicate it now that it's perching in his cranium like a raptor ready to dive in for the killing strike), and sees Keira, curled up on her side, both hands tucked up under her cheek. The sheet is tangled around her calves, and she is naked from her lovely, dimpled knees all the way up to the tangled spray of her hair on the pillow.
He lets out a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, and just looks at her. The mark Nic had left on her collarbone is gone, faded away, and all the other marks from Nic as well, most likely.
And Bill isn't any good at lying to himself. Not usually anyway, even though he knows he's relatively good at avoidance when he chooses to be.
He could push these thoughts away, the confusion of it, fairly simply at this moment. He could put his hands on Keira and slide them along her sleek skin and pretend that his dick hadn't been awake long before he had touched her lovely body. It would be fairly easy.
But it's 5:14 in the morning according to the cheap digital clock sitting at Keira's bedside, and at this hour, it seems pointless to lie by avoidance.
He doesn't know why Nic had been at that particular party. Bill doesn't recall him being the entertainment before or after that one instance (and God, he hopes like hell Nic hasn't been the entertainment since then, either, since Bill had left), and maybe it isn't a regular thing for Nic, or maybe it is, but it isn't regularly people like Dominguez and his crew that he's the entertainment for, but…
Nic had recognized Dominguez, and vice versa. Nic had curled around Dominguez like an affectionate puppy, if affectionate puppies were drug-hazed and sexed-up, and Dominguez had kissed him (Bill's hands clench into fists, uncontrollable and furious and afraid) and Nic had nuzzled his face into Domingez's shoulder, and that is just fucking unacceptable.
"I needed my arse this weekend, you fuckwit!" Nic had spat furiously that day on the rooftop, and now for reasons above and beyond any personal reasons why Bill might look back on that little altercation with pleasure, he is glad that it had happened because at the very least it had kept Nic away from whatever he had needed his arse for. He considers beating Nic up again, just to be on the safe side.
He can't think of any way to keep Nic safe without telling what he knows, what he is, and he's just not willing to do that. And even if he did, he isn't sure Nic would believe it. Nic is smart but he isn't sensible, and he might do it in spite of Bill, as Bill rather thinks he already does it in spite of -- or perhaps to spite -- his uncle Ian, benign (ha!) patriarch of the most fucked up family unit in Bill's experience.
Which is another thing Bill doesn't like one little bit, and can't do a fucking thing about.
He has suspicions about McKellen, grave motherfucking suspicions, and he doesn't let the fact that he doesn't know exactly what they are diminish them in the slightest.
There are too many fucked up criminals revolving around the fringes of Ian McKellen's little galaxy for the man not to be among them, and probably greater than them.
Is Nic one of them?
Bill just doesn't know.
He clearly despises Kate, but Kate isn't really like her father as far as Bill had been able to tell with his rudimentary research. Kate is a thief, but he doesn't think Kate is a killer, and he suspects very fucking strongly that her father is of an entirely different kettle of fish. Maybe John Beckinsale's hands aren't directly bloody, but a man with the kind of connections it takes to not only get off on charges filed by the bloody Eff Bee Eye, but to also command an apology from that illustrious organization of anal retentive fuckwits (ARF for short, old law enforcement joke, haha), is not the kind of man that balks at a little bloodshed. Especially if he never has to actually do any of the work himself. Research into the charges first filed and then rescinded by the FBI (which Bill had done earlier that night, after sex and food but before he'd been able to sleep, while Keira had been snug in her bed alone), revealed that the man eventually arrested for the charges practically screamed patsy. There had been no obvious connections that Bill could find, but with some persistence (three hours of mind-numbingly boring reading), he'd eventually found a reference to a gentleman of similar name (Rob instead of Robert) as an employee of Beckinsale's circa 1979. He had located the reference in an obscure magazine that has since closed down, and even when it was in full circulation, was largely unknown at best. Somebody had missed something, Bill guesses. It's only a guess, but Bill feels pretty secure in it.
All of that aside, Bill is still fairly sure Kate and her father are not exactly birds of a feather. He suspects maybe the only thing Kate has in common with her father is a love of art. He'd checked and rechecked times and dates of trips to various places, and he'd still only come up with a handful of thefts that could be related.
The only common denominator in the things she chose seems to be that they are all valuable, are considered extremely beautiful by collectors and experts -- some of them Bill personally feels are quite horrible -- and none of them have ever surfaced again.
The combination makes Bill suspect that she steals a great deal more carefully than her father, and a great deal more specifically. It's pretty likely that she's stolen a great deal more than Bill will ever be able to track down, because art of this caliber (he learns as he reads article after article) is owned mostly by private collectors, and much of it was procured by illegal means.
Bill isn't sure if she steals the things she loves and keeps them, or if she steals things for other people, commissioned thefts, so to speak, or maybe a combination of both. Either way, some of the things she steals were probably taken from people that had stolen them to begin with, alleviating the possibility of reports being filed or the police being brought into it. Bill wouldn't call her small time, because the things he can track down have multi-million dollar values. But he doesn't think she's in it purely for the money, either.
He's not sure what she is in it for. But he doesn't think it's that.
He doubts Nic knows anything about Kate, beyond the fact that she's usurped his solitary place in his uncle's house, or about Kate's father.
But McKellen…
He just doesn't know. Does Nic know his uncle is a bad guy? Nevermind that Bill can't prove it, he still knows it; does Nic?
And how well does he know Dominguez? Does he know who he is, really, or is Nic really so totally stupid that he'd put himself in the hands of someone as "entertainment" while so stoned/drunk/out of his mind that he has absolutely no self awareness or self control?
Bill is very much afraid that he is, indeed.
He thinks about Nic straddling his lap and whispering in his ear, and he's both amused and annoyed at the whole thing, which is pretty fucking funny considering the fact that he hadn't even remembered it twenty-four hours ago, and his reaction to it is based entirely upon the fact that it's Nic, and Nic both amuses and annoys him pretty bloody consistently.
Stupid twat, Bill thinks. Bloody deserves what the fucking gets, if he's that bloody stupid.
But he can't even pretend he believes that.
He looks at Keira again, the smooth, perfect curve of her hip and the faint flush of her cheeks. A glance down at himself reveals that he is still very much hard -- not that he'd really doubted it -- and he'd really like to touch her. He'd really like to wake her with his lips and his hands, pull her body back against his and press against her, watch her eyes while she wakes up, sleepy and smiling, which he's certain she would be, but that seems…
Dishonest, maybe. He's not sure.
Weird at the very least, and he doesn't want… he can't explain…
He sighs. He doesn't know what he doesn't want and he isn't sure what he can't explain. He just knows it doesn't feel like it would be right to him, so he doesn't.
He stays on his side of the bed and watches it grow light outside Keira's bedroom window.
Had Nic been wearing a collar and a leash? He doesn't remember if he had, in reality, but according to the dream, yes, he had.
According to the dream, Bill had been able to feel it slithering against his chest, moving with Nic's movement, and he had been aware of it like he'd been aware of the pulse in Nic's thigh, as something peripheral but somehow very much present, like the drone of the bass on the balcony and the smell of the red wine Nic had dipped his finger into.
He rubs at his bare chest with the heel of his palm, and he has no illusions about why. He's rubbing away some kind of twisted sense-memory.
He pushes up onto one elbow, shaking his head (like that might somehow erase the dream-memory currently occupying his brain, as though Bill's brain worked on the same principle as an Etch-A-Sketch, but he knows it won't work; it would take lye soap or maybe industrial strength acid to eradicate it now that it's perching in his cranium like a raptor ready to dive in for the killing strike), and sees Keira, curled up on her side, both hands tucked up under her cheek. The sheet is tangled around her calves, and she is naked from her lovely, dimpled knees all the way up to the tangled spray of her hair on the pillow.
He lets out a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, and just looks at her. The mark Nic had left on her collarbone is gone, faded away, and all the other marks from Nic as well, most likely.
And Bill isn't any good at lying to himself. Not usually anyway, even though he knows he's relatively good at avoidance when he chooses to be.
He could push these thoughts away, the confusion of it, fairly simply at this moment. He could put his hands on Keira and slide them along her sleek skin and pretend that his dick hadn't been awake long before he had touched her lovely body. It would be fairly easy.
But it's 5:14 in the morning according to the cheap digital clock sitting at Keira's bedside, and at this hour, it seems pointless to lie by avoidance.
He doesn't know why Nic had been at that particular party. Bill doesn't recall him being the entertainment before or after that one instance (and God, he hopes like hell Nic hasn't been the entertainment since then, either, since Bill had left), and maybe it isn't a regular thing for Nic, or maybe it is, but it isn't regularly people like Dominguez and his crew that he's the entertainment for, but…
Nic had recognized Dominguez, and vice versa. Nic had curled around Dominguez like an affectionate puppy, if affectionate puppies were drug-hazed and sexed-up, and Dominguez had kissed him (Bill's hands clench into fists, uncontrollable and furious and afraid) and Nic had nuzzled his face into Domingez's shoulder, and that is just fucking unacceptable.
"I needed my arse this weekend, you fuckwit!" Nic had spat furiously that day on the rooftop, and now for reasons above and beyond any personal reasons why Bill might look back on that little altercation with pleasure, he is glad that it had happened because at the very least it had kept Nic away from whatever he had needed his arse for. He considers beating Nic up again, just to be on the safe side.
He can't think of any way to keep Nic safe without telling what he knows, what he is, and he's just not willing to do that. And even if he did, he isn't sure Nic would believe it. Nic is smart but he isn't sensible, and he might do it in spite of Bill, as Bill rather thinks he already does it in spite of -- or perhaps to spite -- his uncle Ian, benign (ha!) patriarch of the most fucked up family unit in Bill's experience.
Which is another thing Bill doesn't like one little bit, and can't do a fucking thing about.
He has suspicions about McKellen, grave motherfucking suspicions, and he doesn't let the fact that he doesn't know exactly what they are diminish them in the slightest.
There are too many fucked up criminals revolving around the fringes of Ian McKellen's little galaxy for the man not to be among them, and probably greater than them.
Is Nic one of them?
Bill just doesn't know.
He clearly despises Kate, but Kate isn't really like her father as far as Bill had been able to tell with his rudimentary research. Kate is a thief, but he doesn't think Kate is a killer, and he suspects very fucking strongly that her father is of an entirely different kettle of fish. Maybe John Beckinsale's hands aren't directly bloody, but a man with the kind of connections it takes to not only get off on charges filed by the bloody Eff Bee Eye, but to also command an apology from that illustrious organization of anal retentive fuckwits (ARF for short, old law enforcement joke, haha), is not the kind of man that balks at a little bloodshed. Especially if he never has to actually do any of the work himself. Research into the charges first filed and then rescinded by the FBI (which Bill had done earlier that night, after sex and food but before he'd been able to sleep, while Keira had been snug in her bed alone), revealed that the man eventually arrested for the charges practically screamed patsy. There had been no obvious connections that Bill could find, but with some persistence (three hours of mind-numbingly boring reading), he'd eventually found a reference to a gentleman of similar name (Rob instead of Robert) as an employee of Beckinsale's circa 1979. He had located the reference in an obscure magazine that has since closed down, and even when it was in full circulation, was largely unknown at best. Somebody had missed something, Bill guesses. It's only a guess, but Bill feels pretty secure in it.
All of that aside, Bill is still fairly sure Kate and her father are not exactly birds of a feather. He suspects maybe the only thing Kate has in common with her father is a love of art. He'd checked and rechecked times and dates of trips to various places, and he'd still only come up with a handful of thefts that could be related.
The only common denominator in the things she chose seems to be that they are all valuable, are considered extremely beautiful by collectors and experts -- some of them Bill personally feels are quite horrible -- and none of them have ever surfaced again.
The combination makes Bill suspect that she steals a great deal more carefully than her father, and a great deal more specifically. It's pretty likely that she's stolen a great deal more than Bill will ever be able to track down, because art of this caliber (he learns as he reads article after article) is owned mostly by private collectors, and much of it was procured by illegal means.
Bill isn't sure if she steals the things she loves and keeps them, or if she steals things for other people, commissioned thefts, so to speak, or maybe a combination of both. Either way, some of the things she steals were probably taken from people that had stolen them to begin with, alleviating the possibility of reports being filed or the police being brought into it. Bill wouldn't call her small time, because the things he can track down have multi-million dollar values. But he doesn't think she's in it purely for the money, either.
He's not sure what she is in it for. But he doesn't think it's that.
He doubts Nic knows anything about Kate, beyond the fact that she's usurped his solitary place in his uncle's house, or about Kate's father.
But McKellen…
He just doesn't know. Does Nic know his uncle is a bad guy? Nevermind that Bill can't prove it, he still knows it; does Nic?
And how well does he know Dominguez? Does he know who he is, really, or is Nic really so totally stupid that he'd put himself in the hands of someone as "entertainment" while so stoned/drunk/out of his mind that he has absolutely no self awareness or self control?
Bill is very much afraid that he is, indeed.
He thinks about Nic straddling his lap and whispering in his ear, and he's both amused and annoyed at the whole thing, which is pretty fucking funny considering the fact that he hadn't even remembered it twenty-four hours ago, and his reaction to it is based entirely upon the fact that it's Nic, and Nic both amuses and annoys him pretty bloody consistently.
Stupid twat, Bill thinks. Bloody deserves what the fucking gets, if he's that bloody stupid.
But he can't even pretend he believes that.
He looks at Keira again, the smooth, perfect curve of her hip and the faint flush of her cheeks. A glance down at himself reveals that he is still very much hard -- not that he'd really doubted it -- and he'd really like to touch her. He'd really like to wake her with his lips and his hands, pull her body back against his and press against her, watch her eyes while she wakes up, sleepy and smiling, which he's certain she would be, but that seems…
Dishonest, maybe. He's not sure.
Weird at the very least, and he doesn't want… he can't explain…
He sighs. He doesn't know what he doesn't want and he isn't sure what he can't explain. He just knows it doesn't feel like it would be right to him, so he doesn't.
He stays on his side of the bed and watches it grow light outside Keira's bedroom window.