Izumo's Problem

II.

In the Broken Kunai, it had been fast, so fast he had wondered if it was a dream. The Black Panther, Kurohyou, had sprung from nowhere and sent Izumo from despair to excitement and then into orgasm with a speedy efficiency. But now forty minutes after he’d given permission for Kurohyou stay on the condition that he’d make him come, Izumo still hadn’t gotten what he wanted. With both his clothing and that empty, dead look gone, this Kurohyou with the glowing eyes seemed intent on taking things slow. The shirt that had been left on his back had come off in agonizing inch by inch. Izumo had been licked and bitten everywhere, those hands touching, teasing, scratching, stroking—but never long enough to let him come. Izumo’s cock had been hard and wet since that first moment, but Kurohyou hadn’t even laid the lightest of kisses on it, let alone the jerking, licking, sucking Izumo longed for.

At first, of course, he’d not expected or wanted to come quickly. But ten minutes into things, he was making his need known. At twenty minutes he had tried to take things in his own hands—and found himself with his hands bound over his head. At thirty minutes he’d begun to beg, pleading and promising. And now, forty minutes latter, in despair, Izumo closed his eyes and burst into tears. His body had never felt so completely alive, so tinglingly sensitive, so that he was aware of everything.

And certain spots, spots that Kurohyou had spent time on, where so stimulated that now even the movement of the air made them respond with shivers of sexual arousal. The ball of his left foot was tingling, making his foot arch and stretch, and his toes struggle to reach back to that spot. The back of his right knee—dear god, would he ever be touched there again and not remember how he’d almost cum from his panther’s playing there with tongue, teeth, and fingertips? His left hip, so infuriatingly close to his cock—ah, no, he couldn’t bear to even focus on that—and his right nipple, where that moment of intense pain from the black panther’s bite had long ago turned to amazing pleasure. His left armpit—so embarrassing, so tormenting—and if Kurohyou would just fuck it, thrusting his cock into the snugness between arm and torso, stimulating it again, that might just send him flying over the edge into orgasm. And his neck, oh god, his neck—he kept that covered for a reason. He was always hypersensitive there, vulnerable. Now with hickeys studded around his throat, he was thankful they wouldn’t show tomorrow. But right now, just moving his neck make his cock quiver and the way his hair slid over that rarely exposed skin made him shudder with frustrated desire.

He’d begged and pleaded till he was incoherent, and the tears had come when he felt he couldn’t endure a minute more of this sexual torment—so close to coming but always pulled back by pain or a pause. And in despair he sobbed, big, noisy sobs like he hadn’t cried since he was a child.

And then, with one gulp, his cock was in Kurohyou’s throat, and one of those long white fingers thrust deep inside him and struck his prostrate precisely.

Still crying, Izumo came with a violence and intensity that frightened him. He was completely helpless, his hands still bound above his head, his body out of his control—his heart pounding, his lungs gasping, his muscles spasming, his cum spurting out endlessly. Through his tears, he watched as his black panther pulled away from him, his cum spraying on the ANBU-nin’s check, mouth, chin, and chest. That slim, sleek body arched over him to release his hands. Then that glowing, silent face descended, silky black hair tickling him, and Izumo bucked up, spraying out the last bursts of his cum on that muscled stomach above his own, as his freed hands captured that head, pulling it down for a kiss.

And under that kiss, that intense, consuming kiss that had frightening him at first, his orgasm ebbed away, and something else seemed to fill him up. But he couldn’t think to figure out what it was other than something wonderful—for that deep, satisfying kiss spilled into little kisses and lick across his face, wiping away every trace of his tears. And those incredible hands were caressing him just where he’d wanted for so long. That mouth moved down, and his finger slid back inside, sending another wave of pleasure through Izumo. Lips and tongue cleaned his cock, licking him back to arousal as fingers spread and loosened his ass, opening him up. Izumo’s hands played with that black shining hair, tracing the ears on each side of that head, the long, smooth neck, the shoulders, and upper arms so strong and muscled. There was a magnificent tattoo of a panther on the back below those shoulders, but out of reach. At some point, he wanted to examine that tattoo carefully, to trace it with his tongue and caress it, but for now he settled for what he could reach.

The pace of his panther’s preparation of his ass was slow, but now Izumo didn’t mind, for he was in sensual haze, shuddering, gasping, moaning as now his sexual organs were as stimulated as the rest of his body, his cock coaxed back to hardness, his ass convulsing around those probing, spreading fingers. “Kurohyou, Kurohyou,” he said repeatedly, still not able to form phrases or sentences. Finally leaning up on his elbows, legs spread, Izumo watched his black panther cover his cock with a condom that he produced seemingly out of nowhere and reach for the small tube of lube he’d been using on his fingers. He squeezed the tube, and Izumo moaned at the sight of that clear fluid squirting down on Kurohyou’s cock. The tube was moved forward, and those long fingers squeezed again, and—nothing.

Shit! Izumo wanted to cry—he was finally after almost an hour, going to get this cock in his ass, and now this. He snapped out of his sexual stupor and scrambled back on the bed, saying, “I have lube; don’t move.” But that familiar tube didn’t seem to be in the drawer of his nightstand. Izumo looked back at Kurohyou, who was hiding his face with his hair—something Izumo did all the time, a gesture he immediately read as indicating embarrassment. And embarrassment and his silent, skilled, and elegant lover didn’t mix well. Worried that Kurohyou might just disappear like he had that first time in the Broken Kunai, Izumo leaped up from the bed, saying, “Please, please, I had some in the bathroom, just let me get it.” A frantic search of the bathroom led to finding a small tube of that non-warming kind, and Izumo burst back out of the bathroom—and found himself captured from behind and pushed against the full-length mirror by the bathroom door.

He felt teeth bite down on his sensitive neck, and he cried out and writhed in the arms that held him. Those arms reached down and picked him up, one arm under each knee. Izumo looked in the mirror, and a little cry left his mouth more in shock than arousal. His hair was tussled and pushed back, exposing both of his eyes, letting him see everything even more clearly. His two eyes looked big and dark in his face, which looked a little odd over his exposed neck—a neck spotted with love bites. There were more of them on his chest, stomach, hip, thighs, arms, legs—he was indeed spotted now! And his nipples were redder and harder than he’d ever seen them, his cock fully aroused and jutting out proudly, and his asshole was gapping a little, stretched and ready for fucking.

“Iriomote!” said a low voice near his ear, and Izumo cried out and shuddered. In the mirror, he saw himself respond—his erection leaping, his asshole fluttering, his chest heaving. What a slutty, whorish thing he looked like! He tilted his head down and away, not wanting to see, even as his body still shook with desire.

“Iriomote!” repeated that sexy voice, and lips, tongue, and teeth found the side of his neck. His secret weakness, his neck—oh god, that voice naming him, showing him how his body had been marked, reminding him of how this man holding him could have brought him to orgasm a dozen times if he wanted without once touching his cock or ass—it was too much, and Izumo felt his balls tightening.

“Stop, stop, or I’ll come!” he cried, his body moving itself, beyond his control.

The head lifted from his neck, and one hand moved and was around the base of his cock holding back his orgasm before he’d even finished his words. That grip tightened to the point of pain, making Izumo give a little shout, and his eyes went to those glowing black ones in the mirror.

“Together,” his panther said, and then he lifted and positioned Izumo’s feet on either side of the mirror. “Chakra,” came the command, and Izumo gasped again and shuddered, aroused at his lover’s plan. He struggled to focus his chakra, to concentrate it in his feet, to stand bent over, straddling the mirror on the wall. But using his chakra was distracting his body from its own arousal, making it easy to hold back his orgasm for Kurohyou’s.

In the mirror, he watched that condom-covered cock get coated with lube, saw it line up with his asshole, and then those strong hands were on his hips. Izumo’s eyes flew up from watching his ass to Kurohyou’s face—and then the hands moved and that cock slid in smoothly, penetrating him, spreading him apart, sliding in deep, deeper, until there was no more for him to take. But even as he was crying out at how good it felt, Izumo was focusing on that face over his shoulder, watching the expressions flashing over that face that had at first seemed expressionless and dead: desire, wonder, pleasure, and desire, only somehow stronger. Was that need? What?

Oh, god, not his neck again, oh, god, so hard to focus his chakra, oh lord, look there, look at his ass taking that cock, look at it sliding in and out, slow and sure—in and—“Ahhhhhhhh!” And simultaneously as that cock hit Izumo’s prostrate, that white hand tightened around the base of his cock just long enough.

Then the hand slid up Izumo’s erection as that cock retreated from his ass—and oh, god, then, once again that simultaneous impact of a cock on his prostrate and the tightening of a hand on his cock to hold in his orgasm. “Ahhhhhhh!” burst from Izumo’s mouth as he struggled with the pleasure and pain, the need to come, and the need to hold back to come together. And he watched once more that cock sliding out of his ass, and then—“Ahhhhhhhh!”

Oh, god, pulling out, now--“Kurohyou!”

Panting, watching, oh—“Ahhhhhhh!”
He was pulling it out again--“Kurohyou! FUCK!”

No time—“Kurohyou! AHHHHH! Oh, god, PLEASE!”

Faster now—“Kurohyou! AHHHHH! Yes! YES!”

Too close—“FUCK! AHHHHH! YES! AHHHHHH! KUROHYOU!”

A snarl, a growl, a bite—“KUROHYOU!”

That head in the mirror transforming, mouth opening, crying, “IRIOMOTE!”

—release, sweet release, an orgasm that you feel in every part of your body, pleasure rippling over skin, muscles spasming, pleasure vibrating in your ass as your lover’s cock throbs out its pleasure inside you, and that wonderful, wonderful thing that is your cum rising up and streaming out, each spray an ecstasy that overwhelms everything else.

At the moment of orgasm, his control of chakra lost, Izumo’s body had sank down deeper on Kurohyou’s cock, joining them even tighter as they both came together. They felt and watched each other coming, the two senses reinforcing the other, sharing scent and sound too. They seemed to be releasing their cum in pulses together, and Izumo felt as if they had somehow merged. But then, panting and gasping, they found that peace that comes after a good, long orgasm, a sort of boneless relaxation that sometimes made Izumo feel like he was floating a bit.

For a long time, they stood there still joined in that most intimate of ways, their eyes linked, and it seemed to the chuunin for just a moment, their minds merged. Strange emotions, memories, and thoughts without words were his own—he knew what it felt like to hide in the cold darkness, to leap on a man, to snap his neck, knew how difficult is to move silently over a floor slick with blood, blood that surged over his sandals’ soles, sticky and warm between his toes, knew the feeling of aloneness, of solitude, of days and nights of silence, hiding, stalking, submerging his self until it seemed like he would vanish, knew what it was like to look for warmth, for someone to see him, to know him, to show him that he was still alive . . .

Two curtains of dark hair slid over eyes that shut, over faces tilted down. Spent after his third orgasm of the night, Izumo would have slid to the floor when his panther pulled out, but his strong arms were there to catch him. To his surprise, Kurohyou carried him into the kitchen area of Izumo’s two-room-and-a-bath apartment, settling him in a chair at his one table, and getting them both glasses of water. Then after poking around in Izumo’s cupboards and refrigerator, he set about making them a meal. Izumo felt like he was in a strange dream, sitting at his table naked, sexually satiated, watching the sexiest man he’d ever seen—not even excepting Kotetsu—serve him tea and cook him a dinner in silence, completely naked. His intricate panther tattoo angled across his back, a shocking dark splash across pale white skin. The tale of the tattooed panther trailed down over one ass cheek, drawing attention to an ass that was exceptional, an ass worthy of worship.

The sudden flare of chakra, a shocking revelation of cloaked power, came without warning, without a sound, starling Izumo out of his rapt contemplation of the man in his kitchen. If he wasn’t a chuunin, he’d never have known, for the figure at the stove never stiffened, never stopped the rapid stirring of the food sizzling in the wok. He activated his own chakra, confused, and then realized, with surprise that he’d not noticed Kotetsu coming up to his door. The redhead must have left, for clear as day Kotetsu was at the door of his apartment. But he didn’t knock. Izumo blushed and tilted his head down, letting his hair cover his face. His panther was broadcasting a normal level of chakra for a ninja not trying to conceal his presence. But given that earlier surge of chakra, Kotetsu would have to know that Izumo’s visitor wasn’t an ordinary nin by any means.

`Dammit, just go away, Kotetsu,’ Izumo thought, fretting. But his friend lingered, and Izumo remembered that feeling of aloneness and alienation he’d sensed in Kurohyou, and he suddenly leapt up out of his chair and threw his arms around him, worried he might just think that with his friend’s arrival, Izumo would prefer him gone. He kissed the panther on the naked back in front of him and said in voice that only quivered a little bit, “Great sex and you cook, too, how lucky can one chuunin get in one night?” It was hard to pretend that he didn’t know that his best friend Kotetsu was at the door, silent, listening, but the alternatives were worse—including any number of scenarios in which this sexy thing in his arms would vanish away into that lonely darkness outside.

“Mmmmmmmm,” purred Kurohyou, turning off the stove and emptying the wok’s contents on to a waiting plate. Izumo pushed his cheek into that moving back, his arms around that chest, Kotetsu forgotten as he felt the rumble of that purring sound through his cheek. It made Izumo remember when he’d first heard it in the men’s room, and he liked the idea of their positions being reversed. His cock liked it too and twitched against the gorgeous ass in front of him. Izumo let one hand slide down to find Kurohyou’s penis and the other to search for a nipple. When he found both hard under his hands, he let out a growl and pushed his face into that silky black hair seeking the flesh of his panther’s neck. Pinching and stroking, his mouth found its way through that silken black mane on its own, and his lips and teeth fastened on the flesh beneath it, biting and sucking.

It was exhilarating and arousing to be playing like this, knowing the man purring and pushing his cock into Izumo’s fist could seize control any second. Oh—like this second! Izumo was suddenly holding air, then spun around and seized. His back was against the cold metal of the refrigerator, his legs each over an arm, and the panther’s penis at his anus. But instead of thrusting up into him, Kurohyou hissed with frustration—no condom!

“I’m clean, I swear,” said Izumo, thinking only that he wanted to feel that cock inside him again. Those black eyes looked at him with such intensity that he blushed, realizing that wasn’t the sort of thing you were supposed to say the first time with someone—even if you felt you had been in their mind. It was silly to be embarrassed about just those few words when he was naked and exposed to this piercing, black gaze, but all that thought did to Izumo was make him even more self-conscious and shy, and his body suddenly shook, and he folded his arms over his chest as if that had been a shiver from cold. He looked down as he always did when embarrassed, the safety blanket of his hair falling over his face. It was even siller, perhaps, to feel a little safer just because your vision was blocked by your own hair, but it had always made Izumo feel calmer.

“Me, too.”

For just a second Izumo thought the man holding him was talking about his hair, but then he realized he mean he too had no sexual diseases. With a cry, Izumo raised his head, and another quick, involuntary wave of movement passed through his body. This time he was conscious--even as he looked into those black eyes--of his anus moving against that cockhead poised beneath it. That clean cockhead could be pressing against his prostate in just seconds—and Izumo put his arms on those shoulders in front of him and leaned across the little space between them, whispering as his lips hovered just a centimeter above Kurohyou’s, “Please do it; it’s ok.” And it was, it really felt ok—he didn’t mind at all the though of this ANBU nin entering him bare and filling him with cum. He never experienced that and had heard it was messy and annoying to clean out, but somehow the thought of this man’s cum inside him was exciting him, making his cock leap and dance in between them. He pressed down, and those lips parted, and then, oh yes, then it was better than ok.

As their tongues slid over each other’s, Izumo was lowered, and Kurohyou thrust up. With only traces of the lube left inside Izumo from their earlier sex, it was a rougher penetration. After only a few strokes, Izumo flinched at the first hint of pain. There was a flare of chakra, and Izumo’s back was against the mirror in the bedroom. Slowly, Kurohyou lowered their bodies, so he could seize the lube that had fallen there from before and push it into Izumo’s hand. Then demonstrating his superb strength again, the ANBU nin rose up again in one smooth move. Izumo shuddered at the sensation of that cock fully buried inside him as they rose up. And as his lover slowly pulled out and pushed back into him, Izumo struggled to open the tube and coat his fingers. He moaned and quivered as one slow push inside hit his prostate. When his body stilled again, he reached down awkwardly, grasping around to find that cock half out of him, smearing the lube on his fingers around it as best as he could.

Slam! That cock thrust back inside, hammering his prostrate and making Izumo cry out and drop the lube. A rapid withdrawl and another quick slam—and then Izumo’s back was thudding against the mirror as Kurohyou fucked him fast and hard, almost frenzied. It wasn’t a pace that could be kept up long, and snarling and spitting on his hand, the panther nin crossed the short distance to the bed. Izumo’s back dropped down, his legs went up, that spittle-wetted hand found his cock, and then it was just pure fucking, primal and savage. Izumo forgot everything, but that he was being taken, pounded, nailed to the bed, his cock jerked and worked with a speed and force just on the edge of pain. He thrashed and clawed at the bedding beneath him, tearing it, and then screamed as he sprayed out another load of cum even as the body above him slammed in him again and again, with his hips in a bruising grip. His orgasm over, the cum oozing over his stomach, Izumo stared up at that face above him, beautiful, intense, alive, and cried out, “Kurohyou, my Kurohyou!”

“AAAAHHHHH!” screamed his panther, climaxing inside him, his cum bursting and spraying without a condom. Izumo screamed too, feeling that warm sperm fill him up, overwhelmed with how intimate, how submissive, how, well, possessed, even owned, it felt to have his ass full of another man’s cum. No dildo, no vibrator, no cock in a condom could make him feel this. And that look, that look that earlier he hadn’t quite been able to figure out, was back on Kurohyou’s face, and now he had a name for it: possessiveness.

And those elegant, yet strong white hands pushed back Izumo’s hair, exposing his face. Then moved on his neck, making him squirm and cry out, his back arching, his ass contracting. Fingers trailed in the cum on his stomach and then slid over his mouth, pushing gently. Izumo opened and sucked those fingers inside, tasting his own cum. What would Kurohyou’s cock taste like? How would it feel in his mouth—oh, god, those eyes knew what he was thinking as he sucked on these fingers, knew he was wanting to suck on his cock, the cock inside his body right now. Panting, want seeped into him, awakening his desire again. The hand at his mouth and on his neck pulled away, and he whimpered at the loss. Those hands found his nipples—so stiff and sore already and flicked and rolled them, making Izumo moan and whimper even more with the painful pleasure. The man standing above him was enjoying this, enjoying seeing him react to his touch, laying there so completely fucked, so filled, so vulnerable, so under his control.

The fingers on his nipples suddenly tightened and twisted, and Izumo’s hands flew up to pull at them, his back arching to force up his chest and try to relieve the pressure, and he cried out, overwhelmed by the pain. But even as he cried and his hands tugged at Kurohyou’s, his cock hardened rapidly despite its recent orgasm and the two before it. Izumo thrashed and cried, aware of Kurohyou’s own cock still inside him pinning him down, holding him there on the bed, as were those hands of his so cruelly squeezing his nipples. As he jerked his hips from side to side, he couldn’t help but feel the cock inside him swelling and stiffening, the cum moving inside him, making him feel the need to push out that cock, push out that come. And the fact that he couldn’t, even as his ass muscles tightened and pushed down, excited him unbearably—and his hands were no longer tugging at Kurohyou’s but simply clinging to them, and the pain on his nipples had gone beyond pain into something else. He hadn’t known he would find a little pain so incredibly erotic, hadn’t know his body would respond so wildly to such a show of dominance.

His nipples were a mass of heat and sensation, but it was so arousing his cock was now leaking precum and jerking wildly. He was going to cum again, cum from this torment, cum from having a cock and cum in his ass and his nipple tortured into a point that the pain felt so good, so exciting he was now twisting his torso and rocking his hips, intensifying the fiery sensation on first one and then the other nipple. The movement of his hips made him more aware of the cock and cum inside him, and he rocked his hips and torso frantically, his hands clinging to Kurohyou’s forearms.

The fingers on his nipples tightened just a bit more and that cock pushed in a bit deeper, and the black eyes sucked it all in, a look of fierce ownership on the face above him. Izumo screamed and tears began to stream down his face, and then the hands released his nipples, making him shriek and sob as the blood rushed back into them. Those hands swiped across the cum on his torso once more and found his cock, jerking him hard once, twice, and bringing him to climax again. This orgasm seemed to scream through his body like the sound ripping out of his throat. It was short and powerful, like the whole experience, and left him shattered in its wake.

Unable to move, he could feel a wetness, a warmth, a fullness filling him around his lover’s cock still fully sheathed inside him. He’d never come twice so close together like that, never come from a lover’s touch that danced between pain and pleasure, never come with a lover’s cum still wet inside him, moving inside him as he contracted—in short, as he lay there blinking and trying to remember his name, everything in his sexual past now seemed dull and boring, and most of his fantasies tame.


Kurohyou picked him up and carried him to the bathroom, still impaled on his erection. But there he lifted Izumo off him and placed him on the toilet, letting him eject a lot of the cum inside him. He purred, stroking Izumo’s hair and shoulders, and when the sounds indicated Izumo was pretty much empty, he started the shower. Once in the shower, Izumo cried out as the water hit his abused nipples, his hands coming up to cover them. While he stood there, arms crossed over his chest, hands sheltering his tender tits, Kurohyou washed his body and hair with careful thoroughness.

Izumo was conscious of his ANBU lover’s erection the whole time, shivering each time it slid across his body or pressed against him in the course of his washing. But at last when he was clean, Kurohyou’s arms crossed over Izumo’s, and after turning him away from the water, he pulled the chuunin’s hands from his chest and placed them on the shower wall. He adjusted his uke’s body, soaped his own dick, and then thrust into the juncture between his thighs, just under Izumo’s ass and balls. His hands moved back over Izumo’s, his mouth found a spot on Izumo’s neck, gently nipping and kissing, as he slid his cock in and out of that tight space. There was none of the haste, the urgency of earlier—it was simply smooth and steady until the end, when with short little burst of furious energy, he pumped rapidly in and out before coming with the softest of cries.

He released Izumo and began to quickly and efficiently wash himself. About three minutes later the shower was off, and he dried himself in less than a minute, then took his time with Izumo. He was careful not to brush or touch Izumo’s sore nipples, and he parted the exhausted uke’s wet hair exactly where Izumo always did, drying it and leaving it looking as he had done it himself. When he would have left the bathroom, Izumo caught at him, saying softly, “Let me comb out and dry your hair, Kurohyou.”

It was rare that Izumo got to touch someone so intimately without sex. He was close to Kotetsu, but he’d never combed his hair or dried it unless Kotetsu was injured. And he’d made a mess of styling Kotetsu’s spikes, making him look rather laughable. But his panther-nin had no complex style to fret over. Izumo put a little detangling conditioner on his hands and worked it into the wet mass, then slowly combed it out, drying it. He loved touching the soft black hair, and after he’d blown it dry, he brushed it slowly, lovingly. It wasn’t until the sound of Kurohyou’s stomach growling filled the little bathroom that he put down the brush.

They made their way to the kitchen area in silence, and there, as if they’d discussed it, Izumo set about making fresh tea while Kurohyou reheated their food and dished it out. It was only after they’d sat down and begun to eat that Izumo remember how Kotetsu had been at the door the last time they were in the kitchen. He checked and sensed that familiar chakra down below, down in his bedroom, and smiled.

Hissss!

Startled Izumo looked into a pair of black eyes that looked, well, quite annoyed. The face they were set in was stiff and cold again. The silence that had been so peaceful, now felt loud and awkward. Izumo opened his mouth to speak, sighed, and then almost sighed again at the effect of that sigh—a further stiffening and chilling of the figure across from him. He wriggled on his chair, embarrassed, confused, and feeling oddly guilty.

He had the right to contact his closest friend, his teammate—but yes, but it was a bit odd to do it when with a lover—but they were hardly lovers, were they? They’d just meet; this was just about sex wasn’t it? But what sex! He’d come five times tonight! And this ANBU nin, no, his Kurohyou, his, Izumo’s, yes, his—suddenly Izumo felt a horrid rush of jealousy thinking of him picking up men in restrooms, in other sordid places, or even worse, thinking of him fucking other Konoha ninjas that Ibiki had recruited. How many other ninjas in Konoha liked to bottom and were lonely and unattached? How many men had Ibiki given little red cat bowls to, asking them to put them out when they were in the mood for an ANBU fuck? Suddenly Izumo knew what he’d do when Ibiki visited him in the morning and offered to leave one of those little red bowls with him: he’d say no.

He’d say no because now that he’d slept with Kurohyou, how could he sleep with his teammates or friends? But if he didn’t put out that little red bowl that Ibiki had given him, would he ever see this panther nin again? With little cry Izumo stood up and flung his arms around the naked man sitting as his table looking so cold and distant. He pushed himself down on Kurohyou’s lap, laying his head on his shoulder, clinging, trying to think of what to say. As he pressed his chest to the seated nin’s, the simple pressure of the contact made his nipples ache and sent a shiver of desire over him. With his eyes shut, he whimpered and tightened his grip on the man underneath him. And then he felt a warm hands—one on his back and one on his thigh.

Two hands—how could two hands touching him make him so happy? Make him want to cry in relief? Make him want to kiss and cling and caress and seduce? Because he, silly fool, was in love, ridiculously, stupidly, idiotically in love with a man that didn’t talk, couldn’t tell him his name, was sinfully good-looking, a god in bed, and a good cook to boot! Suddenly it didn’t matter how pathetic it sounded, Izumo just had to ask. He lifted his head up and staring at the eyes that were glowing again, said in a pleading tone, “Please be my boyfriend, my lover, my Kurohyou!”

Izumo bit his lip, staring at that face without an expression, that face that had not looked surprised, pleased, or moved at all by Izumo’s request. The eyes, however, were still glowing, not cold. And then in the silence Izumo could hear that soft purring murmur, and that silent face leaned in for a kiss. But Izumo’s hand moved and caught his lover’s chin before he could close the distance between their lips. “Please, just one word, and I won’t ask for any more,” he whispered.

His wrist was grasped, and his hand moved down and placed against Kurohyou’s back. Then the panther nin’s hands came up and caressed Izumo’s face before gently tilting it to the side. Izumo felt that silky hair on his shoulder, warm lips kissing his ear.

“Yes.”

The lips moved down to his neck, nibbling and licking and biting, until Izumo said laughingly, “Food first, then sex and sleep, and then more sex, and food and sex, and still more sex, if you can stay.”

“Mmmmmm,” came that now familiar purr.

“Mmmmmm,” agreed Izumo pulling his plate across the table, staying on Kurohyou’s lap. And perfectly content they fed each other between kisses, not caring the food was getting colder and colder as the kisses got hotter and longer.

When at last they abandoned the table, they made their way to the bed, kissing all the way until they fell on the bed. This time it was gentle, neither slow nor fast, but just perfect. And as they slid into sleep with Kurohyou curled around Izumo, they didn’t need any words between them. But the last thing Izumo remembered, or maybe the first thing he dreamed, was Kurohyou whispering to him, “My Iriomote.”

His. All his, dreamed Izumo.

And without realizing it, Izumo’s He, His, and Him was no longer Kotetsu. Izumo was all His, and there was only Him, the one He now in the chuunin’s life: Kurohyou.