Maygra & Bone

They'd looked at the house five times. They'd looked at others too—better houses, less expensive houses. Houses that weren't going to need every hour of their free time to be livable. Houses that had new carpet and incredible kitchens. Houses with hot tubs.

But they kept coming back to this one, with its wide front porch that needed to have some boards replaced. With its kitchen that hadn't been upgraded since the '70s—the ugly side of the '70s. The one that needed paint and carpet and a couple of windows replaced.

This one, with its huge second floor master in the converted attic and guestroom downstairs. This one, with the fenced backyard and the detached garage that also needed some serious work. This mid-'30s Craftsman-style house right on the edge of Echo Park, that the inspector said despite its half-renovated interior was actually in pretty good shape, didn't need anything major in the way of plumbing or wiring, had a sound foundation, new HVAC, a fairly new roof, and a healthy lemon tree in the backyard next to a cement patio that would be big enough to hold a grill, a picnic table and still have room for a volleyball net.Ý It had an unimpressive pool that needed tile work.

The floors creaked and the kitchen smelled of citrus and old wood. The upstairs bathroom had a separate shower and bathtub and had been remodeled in the last five years despite the wear on the rest of the house.

It reminded Brian of home. Not the pool or the lemon tree. In fact, little about it reminded him of the house in Barstow—but it still felt like home in a solid and enduring way.

In a strange way, it reminded him of Dom.

There was no one living in it at the moment, and after the fourth visit, the Realtor just told them the lockbox combination, saying, "Hey, if you can't trust a copÖ" It had been on the market for several months—which was almost unheard of . It sat up above its neighbors, fairly close to a busy intersectionÖnot great for kids or people who didn't like the sound of traffic.Ý A few blocks away, there were gang signs everywhere, businesses with bars on the windows, a few too many homeless people. A couple too many bars.

It was six miles from Dom's garage and four minutes to the small police substation Brian now worked from every day.

"Do you know anything about carpentry?" Dom asked him.

"I know which end of a hammer to hold," Brian shot back as they toured it again, taking note of the built-in bookcases in the living room, which looked like a very big dog had been chewing on them.

The work the house still needed put it right at the edge of their price range, and they went round and round about whether the location and the privacy the house offered outweighed the financial burden it would bring. Some of the work they could do themselves, but the rest? Well, time wasn't something they had in surplus.

Not that they were complaining. Once his assignment had come in, Brian had dived in immediately, surprising no one. He literally walked a beat—not in a traditional uniform but in jeans and an LAPD t-shirt, spent his day with two other local cops, assisting in everything from giving directions to helping Mrs. Carlisle retrieve her deaf dog.Ý People already knew him by name—the old and young ones called him "Officer O."

He worked far more regular hours in the office/community information center, but that didn't stop their phone from ringing in the middle of the night. If a crime was reported in the area, he was on the first response team—a familiar face helping to smooth things for the regular black and whites that rolled. From domestic abuse calls to parents panicked because their kids weren't home by eleven, it wasn't any different than the calls Brian had answered in patrol car. It didn't happen every night, but often enough.

Despite the interrupted sleep, he liked it.Ý He liked being able to follow up with people. Not everyone was thrilled by the police aspect of community policing; some of the more belligerent people in the area thought the cops were overly intrusive. But with cops on the street everyday, the pushers generally moved on. The bars on the windows of the corner market didn't come off, but the door stayed open.

Brian wasn't naÔve enough to think he could stop everything, but being able to actually see the little changes made all the difference in the world.

Dom had been intrigued but skeptical about the whole job-training "invite the kids to the garage" deal, grousing that he'd be replacing tools every week when they got lifted, and it was true that he had to replace a few—but it came out of funds for the program and after a few weeks, the kids who were interested were really into it. And so was Dom. He could be as gruff and menacing as he wanted. The kids weren't cowed when he told them to respect the tools, respect the cars—they respected him.

From the minute Brian accepted the assignment and Dom signed on, they knew they'd have to move, and the midnight calls that put Brian on the road to get back to "his" community put some additional pressure on, so they'd started looking.

And kept ending up here.

Brian walked upstairs to the converted attic that would be their bedroom. Afternoon light slanted through the slats of wooden mini-blinds on a dormered window. A huge ceiling fan tempered the heat. The bed would fit right there, snugged in the dormer like a puzzle piece. The bench-wide windowsill would give them plenty of room for a light, a few books, their stash of lube and condomsÖnot that they'd needed any recently, and they'd gotten haphazard about the condoms anyway, over the recent months. Dom hated them, and Brian couldn't seem to rationalize the need for them when they were both clean. It wasn't like they were looking anywhere else.

Brian listened to Dom's heavy footsteps on the floor below, imagined hearing them every morning, imagined waking to the sight of the beamed ceiling, the sound of his neighborhood nearby, and wanted it all so bad he could taste it.

Just that, the wanting of something, still felt welcome and a little bit new. He'd shut down for a while there, only surfacing when Dom came into view, made him do stuff. It hadn't taken long to pull himself out of it, and the new job had sure helped, but anytime he felt a wave of anything, he enjoyed it, rode it out, tried to savor it.

Looking Hack in the face might have taken years off his life, but he was damned determined to enjoy what he had left.

Dom hadn't quite switched gears yet. He still tended to treat Brian like he was made of shattered glass. The first time Brian had taken Dom's hand and put it on his morning erection, Dom had patted it, said something about not straining himself, and launched himself out of bed for the bathroom. Brian had jerked off, irritated, then made sure Dom saw the wet tissues he tossed in the bathroom trash.

The next time Brian reached for him, Dom did the honors.

Slowly, steadily, they'd gotten back in the groove, working, eating, sleeping, fuckingÖexcept they still weren't actually fucking, and after a while, Brian finally figured out that if he ever wanted Dom's dick up his ass again, Brian would have to be the one to put it there.

He walked to the dormer, sat on the window seat and bounced a couple of times. Nice and solid, no give to indicate warped or rotted wood. He reached for the mini-blind cord, pulled them shut, leaving the attic shadowed and close.

Oh, yeah. He toed off his shoes, tugged off his shirt and socks, then went to the top of the stairs.

"Hey, Dom," Brian called.

"Yeah?" Sounded like Dom was in the kitchen.

"Can you come up here? I've got a problem," he said.

"Be right there," Dom said.

Brian heard water run in the kitchen sink, then Dom's footsteps on the creaky board between the kitchen and living area. No way were either of them sneaking around this house — the place was booby trapped.

Brian leaned back against the windowsill, crossed his legs at the ankles. He'd gained back the few pounds he'd lost, and the walking beat had done his body good. He felt good.

Dom stopped at the top of the stairs like gravity had just kicked in. He stared at Brian, swallowed.

"UmÖwhat's going on?"

Dumb question, Toretto. Brian slid a hand down the front of his jeans, squeezed the heat strangling there.

"I told you, I've got a problem," he said. God bless Dom; he didn't even blink before he started unbuttoning his shirt.

"Please tell me the Realtor's not coming," Dom said as he untied his boots, shoved off his socks.

"The Realtor's not coming," Brian said, unbuttoning his jeans. "Nobody's coming except you and me."

Dom laughed, almost tripped getting to him.

Brian caught him, pulled him in, opening Dom's mouth with his tongue, starving for him. Dom made a noise against his mouth, tilted his head to let Brian deeper, letting him take charge.

Brian kept Dom's mouth busy while he worked on the buttons of Dom's jeans. They broke apart long enough to get naked, then stood still, inches apart, breathing too hard.

Brian put his hand out, touched Dom's chest, waited for him to meet his eyes.

"I want you to fuck me," Brian said.

Dom lowered his eyes, and Brian pinched his nipple, hard.

Dom yelped and pushed Brian's hand away. "Brian, I don't —"

"I do," Brian said, reaching for him. He sat back against the windowsill, pulled Dom between his thighs. It put that offended nipple right at mouth height, so he licked it, felt it rise up under his tongue, felt Dom bend to him. "I'm all right, Dom. I'm not gonna freak, or break, or anything except maybe yell really loud."

Dom cupped his face in his hands, lifted his chin, took a good long look, then smiled.

"Okay," he said softly.

Brian decided he'd lied, he might freak after all, because fucked or not, it felt like Dom was already living inside him, burrowed deep, a solid and constant part of him.

Dom's hands traveled from Brian's collarbone to his crotch, callused fingertips just grazing his skin, making him shiver. "Feels like it's been a long time," Dom said, leaning in to run his tongue up the long tendon at the side of Brian's neck.

"That's because it has been," Brian said. "I've done everything but lube up and climb aboard, Dom."

Dom chuckled against his neck, sending an arrow of heat to his dick. "I'm a little slow."

"No shit," Brian grumbled, but it looked like Dom might be getting with the program, because he was lifting Brian further onto the seat, spreading his thighs, groping his balls, then behind them, pressing his fingers rhythmically in the space there.

Brian closed his eyes and tipped his head back, leaning back against the closed blinds, planting his feet wide on the sill. "God, Dom, I've missed this," he moaned.

Dom's fingers answered him, pressing hard and tunneling back toward his hole. He stopped, and Brian opened his eyes.

Dom looked a little wild. His stiff dick had lifted almost fully vertical, not easy for something that size, and he was sweating. "I got nothing," Dom said. "To make it easier."

"Dom," Brian said, reaching for Dom's dick and using it as a lever to bring him closer. "You don't get it. I don't want it easy."

Dom fell on him, manhandled him until they were both pretty much horizontal on the wide window seat. Brian felt hard boards beneath, and hard Dom above, and sighed. Finally.

Dom reared up between his thighs, looking not quite real and all too human. Brian licked his own palm, wrapped it around Dom's dick, slicking it up. Dom did the same, and their hands met on Dom's erection, swabbing it down, firing them up.

"Sometime," Brian said.

"Yeah," Dom breathed, and his dick twitched.

"I want you to jerk off on me," Brian said.

Dom's hand crushed his, and his other hand left Brian's balls to pull on his own.

"I thought you wanted me to fuck you," Dom said, breathing like he'd been climbing a mountain.

"I do," Brian said.

"Then stop talking," Dom said, and he took Brian's hands, put them over his head, and shut him up the old fashioned way.

By the time Brian figured out that Dom had let his hands go, Dom had already lifted his thighs, holding Brian's weight on his forearms. "I can't wait any more," Dom said.

Brian lifted his hips. "Then do it."

It had been too long, and Dom wasn't nearly wet enough, but Brian wouldn't have changed anything; it didn't have to be perfect, it just had to be now. Dom spread him open, thumbed him deliberately, then lined up and entered him in one slow, steady, heavy shove, until his balls hit Brian's ass, rough hair teasing Brian's stretched, aching hole.

It hurt. Not a lot, but he would feel that Dom had been there for awhile, and that suited him just fine.

"Jesus," Dom said, his voice rough.

Brian flexed underneath him, forcing the motion Dom still seemed hesitant to start.

Dom groaned, smacked the wood on either side of Brian. "Fuck."

Brian lifted his hips again, pulled himself off Dom, then dropped back until Dom's full length seated itself again. "Do it," he breathed.

Some trigger had been tripped—Dom lowered his head, hoisted Brian higher, pulled back and slammed into him.

Yes, yes, that was it, what he'd been waiting for, what he remembered. Dom's weight over him, in him, nothing else in the world to see or want, just this, the deep plowing of Dom's body into his.

He heard Dom's ragged breathing over his own continuous low moans. He couldn't stop the sounds anymore than he could keep his hand from reaching for his own dick, slick and tight on his stomach.

Dom's rhythm stuttered when Brian grabbed his dick. Brian said, "You like that?"

Dom nodded, his head swaying drunkenly. "Yeah."

"Watch," Brian said, slowly stroking his dick, lifting his balls so Dom could see himself disappear into Brian's ass.

Dom's arms started to shake. He coiled up, pressed Brian's knees back towards his shoulders, so Dom's chest touched Brian's, so Brian's dick smeared against Dom's stomach, and he thrust powerfully, his eyes slipping shut.

Brian closed his eyes, too, felt Dom's thrusts move him on the sill, heard the blinds rattle above him, and then went deaf and blind as Dom's thrusts hit that good spot, that just right spot, way deep, and his hand clamped down hard on his dick as it shot one pulse after another onto Dom's chest, his own chest, his hand.

Dom roared something, yanked him a little harder, and the wooden blinds crashed down on them just as Brian felt Dom's dick explode in his ass, heat pouring into him.

"Shit," Dom said, thrusting out of control, almost folding Brian in half.

"We broke it," Brian said, laughing and gasping, Dom's dick still hard as a hammer in his ass.

"Guess we'd better buy it, then," Dom said, wrapping his arms around Brian and holding on tight.

"Guess so," Brian said, smiling against his cheek.

***

They had the housewarming Toretto style. That's what Brian called it, grinning as he helped Dom wrestle the big half-drum grill off the back of a borrowed truck and onto the patio. They had a little square one that Brian had bought a couple of years ago, but it was in no way up to the challenge a full-on spread for family.

It had been almost a month since they'd dropped the first box of dishes on the kitchen counter and spent a few frantic days getting stuff moved and set up, hauling the bed upstairs, trying to deal with carpet people, who were early, and window installers, who were late.

It hadn't been all that bad, Dom admitted, but he'd learned that bitching and complaining got him a lot of Brian's soothing attention, so he milked it a little.

Mia accused him of being a big old baby and Dom just grinned to himself.

Dom still had a hard time wrapping his mind around it. The house was theirs, in his and Brian's names. Mia was signing the garage over to him and Brian—just a few more pieces of paper to swap. Dom wouldn't take anymore:Ý his parent's house, the market; they belonged to Mia. If she sold the market to Rosa and Santos, it should cover the rest of college and med school if she wanted.

And at the end of it, for the first time since he'd signed everything over to Mia on his way to Lompoc, Dom could actually say he owned something besides his name.

He'd had a few scary moments with the mortgage brokers, ready to just let Brian be sole owner, but his past record, the garnishment of his salary, all of it was gone, just like Bilkins and Moore had promised. TheÝ mortgage broker didn't even blink That extra chunk of "ya done good" moneyÝ from Moore hadn't hurt either; the higher down payment gave them a littleÝ more breathing room, making it so they could just squeak in the monthlyÝ payments on what they were making.

They'd hammered, sawed and sanded until Dom's hands felt like they'd always had a power tool in them. It turned out it wasn't that different from tweaking engines, and he'd been surprised at how much he'd enjoyed the work. There was still more to be done, mostly downstairs, but all the doors worked, the locks had been changed, the truly dangerous boards on the front porch replaced. They'd started painting, but it was going to take a while, grabbing time on the weekends and the evenings.

They still had boxes to unpack in the bedroom, in the kitchen, in the living room, mostly because they kept getting distracted, and their distractions led to all kinds of interesting discoveries about their new home. Like the fact that the downstairs shower was bigger than the one upstairs, and the inset towel bars were positioned just right for fucking standing up. Or that the banister on the stairs needed to be fixed, which they discovered when Dom gave Brian a blow job halfway up and almost killed them both. They also discovered that the porch swing could hold either of them but not both of them. The new one would be much sturdier.

They put a thick pad on the window seat and fixed the blinds. It was their favorite place in the whole house so far, but they still had a lot of exploring to do before declaring a clear winner.

Finally the house was ready enough for company, and they needed a day off, so a housewarming seemed like the perfect excuse. Dom would have loved to sleep in but Brian had shoved him out of bed to start up the grill while Brian got coffee going and mowed the yard. Dom figured he got the better half of the deal even if priming the grill was hot work. Watching Brian get sweaty in just a pair of ragged LAPD shorts would be worth getting up a whole lot earlier.

By noon, there was corn roasting, chicken grilling, and Brian and Mia were putting the finishing touches on the burgers

The usual crew came—Vince and Leon and the girls they were dating this week. Letty showed up with Hector, which surprised no one but Dom. Mia came over early with a guy she'd been seeing from school. Dom thought he was kind of geeky, knew about as much about cars as Dom knew about microbiology, but he was a nice guy and he treated Mia like a princess. It was their third date, and Dom did his best not to scare the guy—too much. Mid-afternoon brought the two community specialist officers around long enough for a burger and a soda, and a few neighbors drifted by to say hello, have a beer. Kids from Dom's garage training showed up, too, a couple of them with their parents, which surprised Dom and pleased Brian.

At one point Dom looked around and realized there were probably thirty people in their backyard, some he knew better than others, and it all felt a little strange. Some of what he felt must have showed in his face because Brian came up to slip an arm around his waist. Nobody, at least nobody in their backyard at the moment, seemed to care that two big old gay guys had moved into the neighborhood.

"What's wrong?" Brian asked.

"Nothing," Dom said, and made a small gesture. "JustÖI think we've become the local United Nations, Bri," he said with a slow smile. It wasn't just the mix of ethnicities they could claim as friends and neighbors, butÖcops and probable criminals, gang bangers and college studentsÖex-cons and kids who might yet avoid that path, Dom thought, watching Leon and Vince and some of the kids gathered in universal interest around Hector's tricked-out Celica, the one they had such fond memories of from their Arizona road trip.

Brian grinned, hugged him hard, then went back to flipping burgers.

With that many people, the food disappeared pretty quickly, and the beer at a slower but steady pace. The house had been toured, shown off, their taste in furnishings and colors well and thoroughly mocked by everyone including Vince, who had worse taste than either of them.

Evening still found a few folks settled around the picnic table, laughing and swapping stories.

Dom went to join Brian in one of the two big redwood lounge chairs under the lemon tree—gifts from Nick Tanner. They were far enough from the others, and it was dark enough, that Dom felt confident he could get away with the hand he slid between Brian's thighs. Brian sucked in a breath and slid down in the chair a little more, one of his hands sliding under Dom's shirt and resting against his belly. Dom sighed and settled back, using Brian as a pillow. He listened to the muted conversation from the table and Brian's quiet breath behind him, and felt absolutely, perfectly content.

He felt Brian's arms close around his waist, and let his body relax. He leaned back on Brian's shoulder, closed his eyes.

This, this simple thing, was what he'd been so afraid of losing that night, way back when Tanner called and yanked their precarious world out from underneath them. He shuddered at how close he'd come—they'd come—to losing it all. Brian dropped his chin, breathed against his ear and held on a little more tightly.

"Brian?"

"Yeah," Brian murmured, licking just under his ear.

"You ever think about him? Knox?" Dom asked, rubbing his thumb along the inseam of Brian's shorts.

Brian shifted against him, prompting Dom's thumb to move higher. "Sometimes. Even after everything, I feel kind of sorry for him."

"How come?" Dom didn't feel sorry for Knox at all.

Brian slid his hand under Dom's waistband, toyed with the rough hair under Dom's navel. Dom took a quick look at the picnic table; they were still talking, laughing, paying no attention at all to the lemon tree or the people in the chair underneath it.

"Some rotten shit happened to him, stuff he didn't necessarily deserve," Brian said. "But I get that he made his choices, too. Somewhere along the line, he could have picked something else."

Choices. It always came down to that with Brian. Having choices, exercising them.

Well, Dom had made his choice, too, and he'd make it again in a heartbeat; he'd still follow Brian anywhere.

"I could've been like him," Brian whispered, like he wasn't sure he should really say it out loud.

Dom turned his head, looked at him. Mostly he could see the tips of Brian's hair and his eyes reflecting some distant light from the table. "You would never have been like him, Brian." The same couldn't be said for himself, but he didn't tell Brian that. "You don't have it in you."

Brian shrugged. "We'll never know. I think I'm just lucky."

Lucky. Shot, beat-up, almost raped, could've been killed. "Lucky?"

"I have you," Brian said.

Dom had to kiss him then, kiss him or cry, and no way was he choking up at his own party. He shifted in the chair, stretched along Brian's side, and pulled Brian's mouth to his. Brian opened wide for him, hot and familiar, and Dom stroked deep with his tongue, showing Brian what he'd be doing if they weren't in a lawn chair in the backyard with half a dozen of their closest friends thirty feet away. He made the rhythm deliberate, the penetration deep enough that Brian got it immediately, cut off a groan and melted against him, rocking the rigid lump in his lap against Dom's hip.

Dom moved his hand around to Brian's ass, sliding up under the worn hem of his shorts, stroking lightly. They hadn't tried out the lawn chair yet, and suddenly that seemed like a terrible oversight, especially with the way Brian's hands were moving on him, under his shirt, thumbing his nipples, tracing the line of hair all the way down from his navel to his dick.

Ý"Jesus, guys, get a room," Vince yelled from the table.

Oops. Okay, not as invisible as he'd thought.

"Get a house," someone else said, and all their friends thought that was just hilarious.

Brian smiled against his mouth, and Dom pulled back after one last lick.

"Caught," Brian said with an unconcerned grin as he pulled his hand out of Dom's pants.

Dom reluctantly let go of Brian's ass. Time enough later, and they were definitely trying out the lawn chair.

"Think we can kick them out?" Dom asked, laying his head on Brian's chest, feeling a little pride at the pounding pulse he felt there.

"There's beer left, what do you think?" Brian said, laughing under his breath.

Dom wrapped his arms around him, holding him tight.

Get a room. Check.

Get a house. Check.

All those choices Brian had made, even if he was still making them based on what he thought was best for somebody else, had brought them here. They'd paid a lot to get where they were, and he wasn't talking about cashing the DEA's check. Funny how when he was jacking trucks, he'd been willing to risk a whole lot more for a whole lot less—just for the thrill, the edge.

There were still risks—life never gave you a guarantee—but there was no price Dom wouldn't pay to keep what they now had. That long, twisting road they'd taken had led them right back to the old neighborhood, right where Dom wanted to be.

Brian's choices had led them home.