Lurking in the Shadows [complete]

\"Heero would never let a piece of shit like you touch him!\" Milliardo spat, writhing and managing to get on all fours once more, struggling to make his legs move so he could get away from this maniac.

His left arm faltered and he fell onto his side, hitting his shoulder on the floor with a painful crack. He tasted blood in his mouth, too-- he must\'ve split his lip. The blonde bared his teeth and struggled to get up again, this time getting his legs beneath him and grabbing onto the glass door to the balcony for support, barely crouching.

\"If you know so much about Heero,\" Duo taunted, crawling toward him slowly. \"Why did you invite me here?\" He smiled again. \"Becaaaaause...you know that I have something you want. Something you need.\"

That was it. Milliardo\'s eyes narrowed as he spun his hand, less on his own strength and more with momentum, and he grinned with vile pleasure as his knuckles connected with Duo\'s mouth.

Duo\'s head snapped sideways, and he turned his head back slowly, tsking and then smiling to show a mix of white and red rimmed teeth. \"I see,\" he said, nodding.

\"Why didn\'t you tell me you were into...\" he swung a fist up and slammed Wind in the side of the head.

\"This...\" two fingers jabbed at the blonde’s Adam\'s apple.

\"Kind\" Duo grabbed some of the blond hair and pulled until their skulls collided. \"Of shit?\"

He grabbed two large sections of hair and crossed them under Wind\'s chin and yanked up behind his head. \"Ever been strangled with your own hair, Wind? Kinda ironic if you ask me.\"

He jammed his knee into the blonde’s chest to tip him up. \"I\'m talkin\' to you.\" He pulled the hair tighter. \"Want to know what it feels like? Near death experience is supposed to be like having the most incredible orgasm. Wanna find out?\"

He lowered his voice. \"Or maybe...\" he said, looking straight into Wind\'s eyes. “Maybe Heero might like that sort of thing. Ya think? You think Heero is working all this overtime because he loves his job? He\'s squirreling it away, and when he has enough, he\'s gone.\"

It was impossible to fight back with any hope of winning as long as his legs and arms were this clumsy, and his left shoulder was aching alongside his head, now. Milliardo coughed, spattering blood down his chin, and elbowed Duo in the stomach, earning enough slack in the grip on his hair to gulp in air for one short breath.

The bitter flavour of his own blood filled his mouth and made his struggled breathing sound wet as he gasped and looked around for something, anything; all he managed to grab was the rope from the curtains...


There was darkness creeping up on either side of Milliardo\'s vision, and his shoulders sagged against his will as the vicious words were slipping into his ears.


Heero... leaving....

The hair was still choking him. His eyelids drooped down to halfway as he could no longer get any oxygen into his lungs and his hands stopped twitching. Milliardo\'s head was leaning forward slowly, and his vision was blurring... This time there was no Treize to bail him out when things got rough.

He dropped the rope as his eyes closed fully, and yet, even as he thought he was dying, all Milliardo could think of regretting in his life was not going to see Heero one last time.

Duo\'s hand slid through the blond strands of hair and pushed some of them away from Wind\'s face. Those scientists who said there was a link between endorphins and sex weren\'t off their rocker after all, because despite everything, he was still rock hard - maybe because of everything.

Christ, was this guy going to go to sleep on him? Why did all the hot ones have a tendency to pass out just when things were getting good?

\"Think they give conjugal visits to men incarcerated for murder?\"

Even in the swimming darkness, Milliardo could hear the words Duo was spouting.


Heero… he thought desperately.


He could hear his own heartbeat thundering in his ears alongside the voice.

Duo picked up the rope and played with it thoughtfully. It would be a lot easier to convince Wind to indulge in a bit of bondage now, rather than later.

He was a lot better at getting out of these things than into them, but really, he didn\'t need to do anything fancy - just enough to keep him from struggling too much. He slapped the cord in the palm of his hand a few times.

He could breathe again... but it was slow, almost relaxed, and he couldn\'t open his eyes yet. It was like being inside a useless body, yet he could still feel pain, and he could hear Duo rustling about. \"Heero,\" he murmured, not even realizing it was said.

Duo looped part of the cord around one of Wind\'s wrists, then made a pass through it and around the other one before pulling to draw them together. Once he\'d managed that, he nudged the man\'s body so instead of falling over forward, he was lying on his side. \"Ain\'t here, remember? Just you and me, babe, like the song. You know, except for that whole trying to kill me on the balcony thing.\" He busied himself with making multiple passes around the bound wrists.

\"You know about it, obviously,\" Duo said. \"Heero\'s a smart guy, but sometimes he ain\'t too savvy, if you know what I mean. Otherwise he\'d have hightailed it out of town as the deed was done. You never stay around waiting for someone to point a finger at you.\"

Slowly he was getting reign over his own body once more, and his right arm pulled away when he felt something shifting it to an uncomfortable position. His cheek was pressed to the floor, and the blood on his lips was dripping to the side rather than down. Duo was still talking, but it wasn\'t making sense.


\"Get out,\" he moaned, rolling his head to the side and trying to move his legs; trying to kick at the brunette, or get away-- anything!

\"Oh, see, that\'s kinda my problem,\" Duo said, moving to sit on Wind as if he were a piece of furniture. \"I came here because I wanted a nice soft bed, and a body next to me to keep me warm, and then you tried to get me drunk, and you led me on, and I can\'t get out if you bloody well won\'t let me in.\"

\"I\'m going to wrench your head off your shoulders,\" Milliardo whispered, smiling and licking at the blood on his lips as his motor skills came back to him. He had found the trick to it; all he needed to do was relax and he earned his manoeuvrability faster.

\"I\'ll tell you this, only because I haven\'t had this much fun in a while,\" he said. \"Heero ain\'t from around here. And I\'m thinking maybe you aren\'t, either.\"

\"Heero is more than you\'ll ever be.\" No longer was Milliardo taking anything this man said to be truth. \"I let you in here so I could find out about Heero; but you weren\'t looking for food, or a bed, and least of all were you looking to help me,\" he swallowed the blood in his mouth.

He folded his hands between his legs and wriggled around on the blonde’s hip. \"I have every intention of getting laid tonight. I could get it out of my system now, or I could take some of this Wild Turkey with me. There\'s more than enough left for me and Heero.\"

Serious ideas about how to take this man\'s life were spinning in Milliardo\'s mind as he fingered the very familiar rope about his wrists. At the mention of Duo doing anything to Heero, the blonde bucked, forgetting his plan of playing helpless.

\"You aren\'t worth being the shit stuck to the bottom of Heero\'s shoes!\" he snarled.

\"Aaah,\" Duo said. \"Heero\'s shoes. Which pair are you referring to? The ones he wore the night he killed a man? Those were a bitch to clean with all the blood.\"

Milliardo\'s throat tightened at the reference to Treize\'s death. If Duo knew about that, then just how much more of what he had said was truth...?

His heart sank in his chest as he froze mid-struggle, eyes wide. He looked up at Duo desperately, his gaze begging for everything he had said to be a lie.


Those stories about what Heero liked with Duo, and the things they had done... it had to be a lie! Didn\'t it?!

Duo stood up and walked over to the forgotten bottle. He picked it up and frowned. \"Let me guess. Cap\'s on the kitchen counter. Ah, well, I\'m sure I\'ll find something I can use to get this home without spilling any. I\'m not sure how much I\'m going to need.\" He ran his tongue over his teeth, tasting the blood that had collected along his gum line.

\"Just remember that I tried to help you, but I see that you don\'t need anything from me. Sorry to waste your time, and thanks for dinner.\" He saluted in farewell with the bottle, moving toward the sliding glass doors.

Heero wasn\'t like that! Heero wasn\'t like every other man whose body Milliardo had known! Heero was... Heero was...


His will broke, and the blonde allowed his head to fall back against the floor. Heero was just another person in the end, wasn\'t he?


Milliardo had been romanticising the man for how long, months? And all it took was this bastard in his apartment to tear down his pedestal.

He didn\'t care if Duo left with the alcohol; there was more where that came from. He didn\'t even care if the man with long hair was going to nail Heero for the rest of the night.


\"I hope you\'re happy with him,\" he said bitterly, closing his eyes.

Duo laughed. \"Happy? Oh, Heero\'s done many, many things to make me happy. I wasn\'t too thrilled about finding all these long platinum strands in MY bed, when I certainly hadn\'t nailed anyone with hair like that, but Heero\'s been pretty good about making it up to me.

But hey, you ever change your mind, you know where to find me, Milliardo.\" He walked into the apartment and his laughter carried from the front door to the balcony until he\'d shut the door behind him.

Saying his name, his real name… it was a threat, but… How? It wasn’t possible! It wasn’t!

How had that two-faced slut learned Milliardo’s real name?!

The blonde sat up slowly, wincing, and strained against his bindings. Treize had taught him several tricks for getting out of ropes or cuffs, and it had come in handy more times than Milliardo could count—and now, it seemed, even after he was done turning tricks for money, he still had to use the skill.

It took several minutes, but once he was free from the rope, the blonde stood and made his way to the bathroom, having to lean against the wall for support.

It didn’t take logical thinking for him to fill the sink and wash his face, or start a hot shower and step under the heavy stream. The water swirling about his feet and into the drain was tainted with blood at first, but it soon ran clear as Milliardo soaped his body and hair.

When he was clean, he turned the water in the shower off and simply sat on the edge of the tub, staring at the patterns his blood was making with each new droplet from his forehead and lower lip. The hot water wouldn’t allow them to close, and now they were bleeding freely once more.

He felt like such a fool.

Why had he ever thought he could somehow win Heero back? And when was it that the supposedly innocent brunette had become such an angel in Milliardo’s eyes?


He supposed he actually owed Duo some thanks… and who cared if his real name was known? It wasn’t like he had any reason to stay in this shit city any longer.

Milliardo smiled anew as he picked up a clean towel and began to dry himself off; he felt… better. Relieved.

Empty.

He headed to the bedroom and rifled through the closet, looking for something decent to wear to work, where he would inform them that he quit. Upon spotting the wrapped box on the top shelf, Milliardo paused, licking the crimson from his lip slowly. He supposed on the way to work he could stop off at Heero’s and give the man his present, the one he’d been holding onto for ages now.

Blonde hair shone under the light of the harsh bare bulb over Milliardo’s bed as he buttoned up the front of his clean suit and took hold of the present, a placid expression on his face. Well, off to work then… but first, a quick visit to the lying husk of a man he had tried to put his remaining faith into.



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