"No," he mumbled. "Don't leave now. Just...just a few more minutes. Waited too long to get here...you gorgeous, gorgeous thing."
And then he was out, sinking into a warm, soft place that smelled of Theo. It was quiet there. It was peaceful. There were no dreams that night, just that fuzzy feeling of being wrapped up in the presence of the man he'd wanted for so long. Even when he awoke to a cold bed and an empty place beside him, he did so with the remnants of a smile, and that smile broadened into a satisfied smirk as he recalled all that had happened.
He reached out and touched the spot where Theo had lain, fingers gliding across the sheets as though he caressed the man's skin. He wondered what it would be like, now, to spend his daylight hours pretending that they weren't meeting in secret in the dark. Somehow, he thought it might actually be easier than pining away unrequited. As he'd told Theo: if he knew he could come back to this feeling every night, he might just be able to accomplish anything.
"Up. Up. I'm up," he mumbled to himself, breathing deep and rolling over and planting his bare feet on the cold floor. He stood, aching and trembling, his first order of business a shameful one. After the whiskey, he pulled on his shirt from the day before, shoved his feet in his boots, and collected his things for a smoke and a wash up. He paused by the door, eyeing the one between his room and Theo's, sorely tempted to do what he knew he shouldn't at this hour.
And then he saw it: a note. A short note. Theo's perfect, careful handwriting. Words rang hollow in his tired mind: I'm sorry. Take care of the dog. "No. No no no. No no no — "
Without reading it, he unlatched the nanny door and burst into silence and the pale light of a dreary winter morning. He was halfway to Theo's bed before the man shifted and muttered in his sleep. Alive. He was alive. He was fine. The breath that had caught in Fletcher's chest left him. He took another as though breathing in the sight of the nobleman would steady him again. He lingered — longer than he should have, but he did it anyway, indulging in the knowledge that Theo was safe and warm and content. At last, he nodded to himself and stepped back into his own room, closing the door firmly. He picked up the note, eye tracing every loop and line and dot.
"Morning!
Reminder we have Edwina coming today and you have training Neal. Please see that he is on his best behavior."
Theo had left a thumbprint at the bottom as a signature. Fletch smirked at it. The man had been careful not to give a single thing away in what he'd written, but that thumbprint couldn't have read more like a heart if he'd tried. But...he was right. Today was tactical. Today was the start of an operation. He had to wrest his mind away from where they'd been last night, and Theo did, too. "Okay, Pretty Boy," he said to the paper. "Message received. Let's do this."
An hour later, with Niles swapped in to guard Theo, Fletch had bathed and changed and downed his coffee and his pasty with a startling new exuberance for life. As he strode down the hall to meet Neal, he caught sight of his reflection in an oversized mirror. The man who'd glanced back at him in passing was one he'd not truly seen in years: confident, sharp-eyed, and cocky as hell. A rogue, some might call him. A heartbreaker and a rake. But what he saw in it was something else entirely:
Heart and soul, he was Theo's bastard man.
