Title: Rush
Author: Trekker (trkkr47@aol.com)
Website: http://trkkr47.seeking-solace.com/
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Giles/Ethan
Warnings: slash, sex, violence, D/s, knifeplay, bloodplay
Sequel to: Adrenaline ( http://trkkr47.seeking-solace.com/fanfic/adrenaline.html )
A/N: Thanks to Davechicken and Phendog for betaing.

Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and any content pertaining to, are the property of Fox and any other holders of said properties. This author has not been authorized by Fox. No infringement is intended.

Slammed against the wall. Air crushed from lungs, bruise on ribs screaming, arm twisted behind his back, heavy hard body pressed against him. Breath in his ear, hips moving against his arse.

Ethan groans.

Ripper's grinding rhythm pushes Ethan's own cock against the wall. Nice wall, good wall.

Ache in his shoulder, as Ripper shoves his arm a little higher up his back. Little sparks of sensation find their way to his nipples, and he feels them tighten into points. Not enough.

"More, Ripper," he says, "Hurt me."

Breath rushes against his jaw and Ripper complies, twists his arm higher, harder. Real pain shatters and scatters and by the time it reaches his cock, it's no longer pain, it's pleasure, pure and sweet, pulsing in his cock. He grinds against the wall. Hurts. Hurts. God, yes.

Sweat breaks out down his back, his arse, his thighs. Everywhere Ripper is sealed tight against him.

Ripper's hand drops down along his side, and Ethan expects him to reach around him and unzip his fly. But he doesn't. Reaches for something else instead.

The sound of the flick-knife is like a physical caress. Touches him everywhere, outside and inside, goosebumps across his flesh, trembles in his muscles. Just seeing it, when Ripper takes it out and plays with it, makes Ethan hard.

He's feeling it, now. The cool flat of the blade, smooth against his throat.

Then the blade rotates, the sharp edge resting over his jugular. He shudders, feels a pulse of wet heat at the head of his cock. He holds perfectly still. For a moment, they are both motionless; frozen in time, it seems. Breathing in sync.

And a small, very, very small, part of him is afraid. The rest of him, though... the rest of him trusts.

"Good boy," Ripper murmurs, as Ethan relaxes.

Then Ripper jerks him backwards, shoves him toward the bed, and Ethan is gasping, panicking, for a moment, at the sudden movement combined with sharp objects, but of course, he's fine. This is Ripper. Ripper, who can tell you exactly how many pounds of pressure it takes to push a stake through a chest, who handles weapons with the same ease as most people sign their names.

The knife is against his throat.

"Don't move," Ripper says, his voice low and dark.

Then Ripper reaches around Ethan and begins to unbutton Ethan's shirt, starting at the collar. The base of his palm runs over Ethan's nipple and Ethan's knees go weak for a moment. He feels the knife press into his flesh, just ever so slightly.

"I said, don't move," Ripper says, his hand still working steadily downwards.

Ethan swallows hard, and that's enough to spark a small flash of pain where steel meets flesh. First blood of the evening, perhaps, but he doubts it. Ripper doesn't draw blood now until Ethan's begging for it.

Ripper finishes and pulls Ethan's shirt off with one quick, cursory tug. Then the knife is gone from his throat. Gone in general. He hears Ripper fold it closed, and then hard hands are gripping him, manhandling him. Turning him around, pushing him down on his back.

They both land on the bed amidst a squeal of protesting springs, and Ripper is pinning him with his body, is yanking his hands up over his head.

He honestly has no idea where the handcuffs came from, but he hears the clink, and twists his head back and there they are and- -no. No, no.

He jerks his hands down, away, and gets a foot up between himself and Ripper, but doesn't manage, quite, to throw him off. Bare foot against firm muscles, he tries again to push him away, but Ripper is on to him now. Is holding his wrists tight, pressed to the bed, is bracing himself.

"Shh, shh, easy, love."

"No," he says, "no, Ripper."

Both his hands trapped under one of Ripper's own, now, aching from the force Ripper's holding him with.

"Just me," Ripper says, "It's just me. Won't hurt you. Keep you safe."

Ethan's still breathing fast and he's still half-searching for escape routes, but then he finds Ripper's steady gaze instead. He's lived long enough to have rules. To know the value of self- reliance. To know one should never allow oneself to be trapped.

Ripper's eyes belie his exterior, his leather and his anger and violence and danger. Ethan's galloping heart slows to a canter then a trot, and then stays at that pace.

Then Ripper dips his head down, and his lips brush over Ethan's.

Ethan melts. Parts his lips and meets Ripper's soft, inquisitive tongue with his own. For a moment, they are quiet. For a moment, the urgency of their play slips away, and they are lost in this kiss.

Ripper's hand slips down, leaves his wrists free, and he cups it around Ethan's cheek as he gently deepens the kiss. It's warm and unexpected and wonderful.

When their lips finally slip apart, Ethan says, "Yes, all right."

He still catches his breath as metal clicks around his wrists.

But his nerves slip away, brushed aside as Ripper kisses down from one wrist, across his chest and up to the other. Then whispers, "Beautiful," as he nuzzles where the coolness meets Ethan's skin. Ethan's tension drains away in one sudden rush, leaving him limp and at ease across the sheets. Ripper's body is warm and solid above him, Ripper's lips still teasing the sensitive spot over his pulse point.

And he can't quite remember why he wouldn't have wanted this as Ripper glides down his body, dropping kisses along his torso and his abdomen and one too-brief nuzzle against his cock through his jeans that sends hot sparks up his body, through his mind. Ripper doesn't stop there, though; he keeps going until he's kneeling between Ethan's feet.

It's ironic, Ethan supposes, but when Ripper reaches into his pocket and pulls the knife out again, it only relaxes Ethan more. Makes him shift his hips on the bed, makes him want to reach down to settle his erection into a more comfortable spot, which only makes him all the more aware that he can't. Can't move, can't touch himself, can't get away.

Arousal and fear match pace through him, twine together and heighten each other, and he can't tell which is which as they twist through his gut, flare hot in his groin.

Ripper looks like he's about to speak, but then he doesn't. He leans down and grips the bottom hem of Ethan's jeans. Ethan can't quite see what he's doing, but he feels the jerk as the knife punches through fabric, then yanks back, cutting through the hem. Instantly, he's panting. Feeling Ripper's hands, hot and pressing low on his calf, brushing against his shin. Ripper's face is drawn with concentration, and his eyes are focused downwards.

Ethan lets his head drop back, then, and accepts that he can't see much. Just feels. Listens.

His arousal slowly heightens to an ache, his jeans move against his skin, tugged and rearranged, and then there's a jolt as the knife cuts through another few inches of fabric. The tearing sound as the sharp blade parts fibers.

Ripper reaches his knee and he feels, for the first time, the barest hint of the blade against his skin. There's cool air on his leg where the already parted halves lie open.

He moans.

Sweat breaks out, over his chest, his stomach, between his legs. Waves of hot and cold, and there's another sharp jolt, another rip. Left jeans leg parted to a little ways up his thigh, now, and this is torture. Teasing ecstasy. Just enough to be not enough, just enough to make him tremble inside, wanting more. More of the knife, more of Ripper, more of anything. Wants to be fucked, wants to be cut, anything, he's rapidly careening past caring as his body heats to a boil, and Ripper continues to be nothing but slow, methodical, careful.

He groans Ripper's name as the knife slides between skin and cotton, punches up and jerks down again.

Ripper unbuckles and pulls off Ethan's belt and casts it aside.

Cutting through the waistband seems to take hours of slow seesawing, and by the end of it, Ethan is trembling. Needs to be touched, needs it so very bad. His hands are twitching against the cuffs, nearly unconscious attempts to touch himself.

When the knife finally breaks through the final thread, something rushes through him, something almost an orgasm. Maybe it was an orgasm, a small one, dry but intense. He groans and twists up; he can't help it. Ripper's hand presses restrainingly down on his hip for a moment, reminding him to be still.

Then, Ripper tugs one more time on his jeans and they slip off his left leg, slide a little ways down his right. He's wearing nothing beneath, and he's all but naked now, but he's intensely aware, at the same time, of the denim embraced tightly around his right leg, of the contrast. His cock is bare and wet. That heightens the sensation of air moving against it as Ripper resettles himself.

"Enjoyed that, didn't you?" Ripper says, "My little slut."

Ethan can only find a small sound inside of him to respond to that. Fuck, yes, he liked that.

He feels like he's falling apart, like he's clinging to some precipice and slowly losing his grip, but he doesn't care; it isn't bad, it's thrilling. Like he's sliding into Ripper, like whatever Ripper wants, he wants.

Ripper's looking down at his cock, now, and then he's touching it with a fingertip, skating lightly over the slick film of precome. Ethan groans again, and tries to push up, get more than that maddening tease. Ripper pulls his hand away, and instead runs it up Ethan's side. Almost reassuring, almost comforting. Ethan pushes into that touch as well.

"So beautiful," Ripper's saying, "So very beautiful. And mine. All mine."

Words that tingle in Ethan's chest, that pull his nipples a little tighter, his cock a little harder. That make his heart ache a little bit.

Then Ripper takes away his hand and replaces it with the flat of the knife blade, and Ethan can only whimper encouragement. Smooth metal drifting over his ribs, his flank, the soft skin of his stomach. It retraces the faint scar from the first cut Ripper ever laid on his body, and Ethan arches into it, just a little. It's habit now not to press up into the blade too fast or too hard, but sometimes he can't help but lift into the touch of steel, just a little bit.

"You want this, don't you," Ripper's saying, "Want it as much as I do. Want to feel me slide this through your skin, watch your blood run. Run for me."

It's rhetorical, but he hisses "yes" anyway.

Ripper edges backwards a little, teasing the knife around Ethan's navel, now, around the soft flesh of his stomach.

"I never understood the appeal. Or maybe I only pretended I didn't. The appeal of blood."

Ethan hisses between his teeth. Ripper talking about blood as the knife skirts the edges of his pubic hair. And he's tied down. Helpless.

Terrifying, exhilarating, like standing as close to the edge of a cliff as you can. That head rush of terror and self-preservation that makes you feel so very, very alive.

"To vampires, I mean. Thought it was just nourishment," Ripper says, his voice all Oxford-soft. Ethan knows about that, about Oxford. He's the only one who knows.

By the time the flat metal finally touches his cock, the anticipation has built enough that it's almost a relief. He holds as still as if his life depends on it, but his heart is *flying*. He's dizzy with it. The pulse is so strong in his cock, he's almost afraid it will move against the blade.

The blade that Ripper is moving, ever so gently against the most thin, sensitive skin on his body.

And it occurs to him that there's no one else. No. One. Else. Who he would *ever* allow to do this. No one else who could do this and leave him breathless, leaking with desire, with need, rather than powerfully panicked. Only Ripper.

He closes his eyes and goes limp against the covers, just feeling. The knife moves up his shaft, brushes just lightly against the head. Still just the flat of the blade, nothing sharp.

Then the knife is gone, pulled away, and Ethan opens his eyes again, and finds Ripper straddling his leg and looking down at him. Talking again.

"Never understood, until now. This. It's... blood is life. It's power."

And then Ethan shuddered as Ripper touched the knife to the top of the scar on his stomach again, sharp side down, now. Finally. Ripper drags it down, with just the right pressure.

"Doing this... it means you're mine. Means I can do anything to you."

And he can.

A slim line of red wells up on Ethan's stomach. Ripper is looking at it as he continues, "To a vampire, there's nothing more precious than bloodlines. Sires."

Ethan knows enough about vampires to avoid them, and how to fend them off if necessary.

"A vampire is born when his Sire drinks his blood, and he drinks the blood of his Sire in turn, and ever after, there is a... connection there. Connection of blood. Power."

Then Ripper ducks down and swipes his tongue up Ethan's stomach. Flicker of bright red against the pink of Ripper's tongue, and then Ripper's sitting up again, looking into Ethan's eyes.

The moment hangs, frozen in time. Ripper raises his own hand. Then, slowly, never breaking eye-contact, he draws the blade across his own palm. His brows drawing together slightly for an instant is the only acknowledgment of the pain.

The air in the room seems suddenly scarce.

Hand offered, fingers spread wide, slash of red straight across the center. Ethan hesitates, for a split second, feeling the weight of the moment. Then he dips his tongue out, and catches that first drop of scarlet rolling down. Copper-salt explodes through his senses, and this feels like a promise.

His eyes drift shut. A promise, a pact. He laps at Ripper's palm as though this truly is sustenance. And perhaps, in a way, it is.

"Fuck," Ripper says, and Ethan opens his eyes, rolls his hips up.

Ripper snatches his hand away. Flips Ethan over. The cuffs jerk at his wrist, but the spark of pain is welcome. Is good. Blends with the pleasure as Ripper unzips his own trousers and then rocks his hips, his bare cock, against Ethan's arse.

"Yes, god yes, Ripper," he gasps, shoves back, nothing he wants more at that moment than Ripper, buried inside him. "Fuck me."

Ripper's scrambling for the lube, and it seems to take unbearably long for him to open the tube, for cursory chilly slick fingers to slide over Ethan, inside Ethan, but then, then--

Ripper slams into him, hard and fast, and for a moment, he knows nothing but the pain. Savage, burning pain, that flashes red in front of his eyes and tears a cry out of his throat. Only temporary, he tells himself, as Ripper takes him, and he's right.

The pain eases back to the normal ache, the good ache, with a sharp spark each time Ripper slams in again. But that's good, too. Ethan gasps for air, and finds Ripper's rhythm, and begins to rock back to meet him on each downstroke. Vertigo grips him, washes through him in waves timed with their fucking.

It's beautiful. Intense, wild. Ripper's pressing his face against Ethan's shoulder, breath wet and hot and fast against Ethan's skin.

*Yours,* Ethan thinks, *Yours, Ripper. Always.*

Taste of blood still heavy on his tongue, feeling of blood still slick on his stomach. A streak of red on the white sheets where Ripper's hand has touched.

When Ripper reaches beneath him, grips his cock in his hand-- in *that* hand, the one that Ethan licked, the one that bled for him--Ethan comes after only a few strokes. It drags every last ounce of energy from him and leaves him collapsed on the sheets.

Ripper says "mine" when he shudders and comes inside him.

[ End ]