Chapter Text
“The diamonds are in the Maldives,” Keen said, bustling into the Post Office. “Reddington’s got a lead on one of the missing pieces.”
Donald hummed softly, more than a little surprised that Red had told him the truth, to whatever degree. Keen? Sure. But him? Wonders never fucking ceased. “What’re they doing there? Working on their tan,” he asked drily, mostly ignoring her as he continued with his report.
“I’m guessing that one of Pantazi’s staff had a case of sticky fingers,” she returned as Aram pulled a picture with an obscene number of hashtags and likes up on the monitor. He glanced upward, and Donald vaguely remembered the necklace, held up against a woman’s throat while she smiled fetchingly; the gems glimmering like sunshine against her skin. An ostentatious piece with drop diamonds about as big as his thumbnail, and a price tag that had easily skyrocketed toward the millions. He hummed again, rubbing at his forehead as he straightened in his chair.
“Hello all,” Red called, stepping off the lift, pulling Donald’s attention. For once, Dembe seemed to have been left behind as the criminal stepped into the Post Office alone. “Ah! I see you’ve found the picture. It’s apparently flooding something called The Gram?”
“Instagram,” Aram said quietly, his tone curling with amusement as he bit back a smile.
“Yes, well,” Red drawled, glancing at him briefly. “Instagram then.” He stepped up to Aram’s workstation with his hands neatly tucked behind his back, head tipped up to regard the picture. “One hundred and twenty carats of either VVS1 or IF, F grade diamonds with the most delightful scintillation.”
“I’m not entirely sure what that means,” Aram admitted, looking around at all of them. Donald huffed a sigh as he leaned back in his chair.
“It means that they sure do look pretty in motion,” he deadpanned.
“We’ll make a connoisseur of you yet, my dear,” Red lilted brightly with a laugh. Donald rolled his eyes as he gestured up at the picture, some pretty but otherwise unremarkable B List actress that he might’ve seen once or twice in a forgettable movie from the past few years.
“So, what? You’re going to run halfway around the globe like some modern conquistador in search of something bright and shiny?”
“Precisely,” Red drawled, tipping his head up as his smile cut sharply at his lips. He laughed brightly, gesturing widely to the monitor. “Isn’t that the red-blooded dream? Sun, sand, and sparkles. Empires have been forged on the backs of less,” Red quipped. Donald rolled his eyes, doggedly overlooking the bright smile Keen shot in his direction as he glared at Reddington.
“Some of us have obligations, Red,” Donald huffed out. “Real jobs and bills. Can’t just go running all over the world looking for something that may or may not exist.”
“Speak for yourself,” Keen quipped because of course she would. And of course, Red would probably take her. Donald gritted his teeth and scribbled on the report, trying very hard to overlook what might have been a flicker of jealousy flaring low in his chest. “I could definitely use a week or two on a glamorous beach somewhere.”
“Couldn’t we all,” Navabi murmured to Aram with a twist of a smile, leaning back against his workstation.
“Actually, Lizzie,” Red drawled, sweeping his hat off like he was a master of ceremonies. “I thought I might steal dear Donald away.” He twisted to regard Cooper, fixed the other man with a cheery look. “That is, if you’re amenable to it, Harold? As a reward for a job well done.”
Cooper turned to him with a slight smile. It felt like all the blood had rushed to his face. “I think that might be a good idea, actually. Some time away from the office might do you some good, Agent Ressler.”
Donald blinked and leaned forward slightly in his chair, gesturing at his pile of paperwork. “But sir,” he started in, only for Cooper to just wave him away.
“Nonsense; Agent Keen or Navabi can finish the paperwork. You have more than enough time saved up. And I would hate for someone else to close up the loose end to your case,” Cooper said, his voice tipping loudly with pride as he offered up a smile. “You did a remarkable job on this one; it’s only fitting that you be the reason the diamonds finally make their way into FBI custody.”
“Sir,” Donald started, huffing. “I’d rather stay here.”
“Really, Donald,” Red drawled, shaking his head with a huff of amusement. “All work and no fun makes Don a very dull boy.”
He glared at the older man.
“But Agent Ressler,” Aram broke in, smiling brightly in his naïve and desperate desire to be helpful. “Sunlight’s thought to boost levels of serotonin in –”
“I burn,” Donald said drily, cutting in over Aram’s health tip of the week.
Red leaned against the table that Donald had claimed as his own with a sharp smile. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, Donald, but there’s this marvelous new invention called sunscreen. It works wonders for someone with your complexion. And!” The other man chuckled before he leaned closer to practically whisper in a conspiratorial tone. “I happen to be a master at applying it. I would be more than happy to get your back for you.”
“Bite me,” Donald gritted out as he bared his teeth, which only resulted in Red’s smile sharpening into a leer. The other man pushed away with a laugh, hands folding behind his back as he stepped away.
“Only if you ask politely, darling.”
“Oh, c’mon Ressler,” Keen quipped, shooting him a crooked twist of a smile before Donald could even properly think about responding to Reddington. “Getting outta here does sound pretty nice, you have to admit.”
He huffed a sigh, rolling his eyes as Donald threw his pen down in exasperation because they were all just going to gang up on him until he said yes. “Sure, fine, I guess,” he finally caved. Not like Red would take no for an answer anyway. “When? Like next week or what?”
Red laughed again, his smile widening and sharpening as he circled the workstation Donald had claimed as his own. “Oh, right now, Donny.”
“Don’t call me that,” he grumbled, tipping his head up to huff out a sigh. “And right now, right now?”
“No time quite like the present,” Red purred, his mouth cutting into a grin as he tapped on the desktop. He gestured toward the elevator. “Your chariot awaits, my dear.” Donald blinked slowly, begrudgingly got to his feet. And he was definitely going to overlook it as Red stepped up close, spreading his hand in the small of Donald’s back and steering him into the elevator.
“I’ll need to stop by my place,” Donald started, looking down at the grate floor of the lift because the alternative was to look at Red, which was just about the last thing he wanted to do. Well, after going on some romantic fucking getaway with the older man. “Get some stuff.”
Red laughed, the sound bright and loud in the small space. “So, you can slip inside and lock yourself away? I think not, Donald.” The older man turned a sharp smile on him. “I’ve already packed your bag; it’s in the car.”
“You broke into my apartment?” And how funny it was that his tone didn’t even sound affronted, just resigned because Red didn’t respect any boundaries. A locked door was just a door.
“I prefer the term let myself in,” Red drawled as the elevator drifted to a stop. And his hand was still spread hotly in the small of Donald’s back, the touch proprietary. He wasn’t going to think about that as the criminal steered him toward the waiting Mercedes. So far, he’d done a pretty good job about not thinking about them fucking like animals, had done an even better job of not finding himself alone with Reddington. He had managed to keep work and Keen like some sort of buffer between them, but a week away or whatever definitely wasn’t keeping a buffer between him and the other man.
Red tugged the sedan’s door open and ushered him inside, nearly folding down on Donald’s lap when he didn’t scoot over fast enough. He hummed, twisting to click his seatbelt in place. To his credit, he only jumped a little as Red’s hand spread hotly over his thigh, fingertips digging in roughly as the older man crowded into his space until Donald was practically crushed against the door.
“Have you been avoiding me, darling,” Red murmured lowly. “I do so hope you’re not having a bit of a personal crisis, Donald.”
He gritted his teeth and watched the city drag past in a blur of buildings because it was easier to not think about it like that. It wasn’t exactly a crisis because sex was always a good thing, no matter what he found between his bedmate’s legs, though it was a little different being on the receiving end. And it’d just always been easier with girls, until he’d found himself tumbling into bed with Raymond Fucking Reddington which had wound up being as easy as fucking breathing. Donald huffed because he definitely didn’t want to think about that.
Donald glanced over his shoulder at Red, eyebrow ticking up as his mouth twisted at the corner. “I’ve seen you literally every day at work,” he reminded the other man. Red just hummed, his gaze dragging along Donald’s features until Donald just turned his back dismissively, watching the city drift past the heavy tint of the window.
The ride to the hangar was quiet, unhurried. And the moment the Mercedes stopped, Red was ushering him out of the car, steering him toward the jet like Donald might bolt or something if the older man didn’t keep hands on him. It seemed like it was wheels up practically immediately, not that that mattered because it was nineteen fucking hours on the jet. Nineteen hours trapped in a tin can, something like thirty thousand feet in the air, with Raymond Fucking Reddington.
And nineteen fucking hours was long enough that Donald stripped out of his jacket and tie, anxiously rolled his sleeves, drank approximately half a bottle of whiskey, dug cruel fingers restlessly into his hair, and walked the length of the jet roughly ten times. Red chided him, teased him, and eventually distracted him. By the time they landed, against his better judgement, the rough fingers in his hair had been Red’s, dragging him in until Donald had been awkwardly crammed down on his lap in the seat. They traded biting kisses as Donald clutched at Red’s stupid expensive shirt and cool fingers drew aimless patterns against his overheated skin.
It was a curious feeling, the whole thing with Red. Like he was stitching together at the same time as he was falling apart at the seams, and Donald was pretty sure it wasn’t supposed to be that instinctual, that easy but there they were.
The airstrip was private, with glimpses of the bright ocean barely visible through the tree line and the air alive with the soft wash of waves. A hot island sun beat down on them, softened by a warm ocean breeze, but still the air lingered like a fucking touch – hot and humid, damp where it stuck his shirt to his back and chest every time he breathed. Wasn’t like the place wasn’t beautiful, just Donald would’ve rather appreciated it in deck shorts. In anything that wasn’t thick wool and starched cotton really while Red made small talk with their pilot. And he’d kind of thought they were done traveling, except the pilot just carried their bags to the foot of a pier, handed them off to some guy in a white uniform with a wide, toothy smile. Red ushered him forward with a sharky smile, across weather-worn teak to a speedboat that looked like it had seen better days. Its paint was sun faded and flaking like iridescent scales.
“Stylish,” he drawled, carefully stepped over the side of the boat, gritting his teeth because the slick soles of dress shoes and the damp fiberglass of the deck seemed like a recipe for disaster. He half expected Red to give him a hand down like some fair maiden and was infinitely glad that the other man didn’t. He dropped down on one of the bench seats, watching as Red took to looming over the guy settling into the captain’s chair.
Which, Donald could’ve counted the times he’d been on a boat on one fucking hand. His aunt Cindy lived on the outskirts of Mount Clemens, the family three houses down from her had had a boat. He’d spent a couple of weekends up there the summer before he turned seventeen, drinking pilfered tequila on the lake to the backdrop of too loud music and the louder laughter of rowdy kids. He’d lost his virginity that summer, in more than one way, until his cousin Jacob had wrecked the family wagon and ended Donald’s summer with a broken arm, his mother practically dragging him home by his fucking ear.
The engine turned over, rumbled lazily as the guy steered the boat out slowly into open water like a no waves zone was still a thing even though the beach was empty. The ocean deepened and the captain cranked the throttle, the engine roaring as the hull sliced through silver-tipped waves.
He’d been an inner-city kid, raised in a jungle of concrete and steel and smog. He’d continued with that, because DC was buildings cramped together and people crushed into each other’s space on the metro, the city crawling with tourists from all over the world. There was something … mildly disconcerting, haltingly freeing about the decided lack of the bones of civilization as the boat skipped over the brilliant waves. Because it was just endless ocean, and miles of sky, and the whip of salt-tinged air against his skin leaving behind a gritty sensation.
Red folded down gracefully on the seat next to him, his hand spreading on Donald’s thigh as he leaned in close. “You are awfully quiet, Special Agent Ressler,” the criminal purred in his ear.
“Maybe I get seasick,” he quipped drily, earning him a bright laugh.
“I supposed I’ll just have to keep you below deck then,” the older man drawled, leaning into Donald’s space as he nipped at Donald’s pulse. He laughed brightly, letting himself lean into Red’s pull briefly before he remembered himself. Reddington was a mass-murdering psychopath, and Donald was essentially his hunter-turned-babysitter, and whatever that was that lingered between them was ill advised at best, some sort of suicide at worst.
“I’m not letting you tie me to the bed,” he scoffed, pulling away from the older man. Red’s lips peeled back from his teeth in a sharp smile.
“Isn’t that a shame,” Red murmured, chasing after Donald to press into his space as his fingers curled around his nearest wrist, pulling him back. “I have the loveliest length of black silk that would look so fetching against your skin,” Red drawled, stroking his fingertips along the tender skin of Donald’s wrist. “You would look most delightful tied up. Shibari would make you into a work of art, more so than you already are,” the older man said, tone pitched soft and low as he pressed his head to the curve of Donald’s throat, his lips dragging softly against the throb of Donald’s pulse.
He huffed out a begrudging laugh. “You’re so full of shit,” he scoffed out, getting to his feet and stepping closer to the hull of the speedboat, his thighs pressing against sun-warmed fiberglass. Honestly, Donald just needed a little bit of space between them, a little buffer to breathe and fucking remind himself what a spectacularly stupid idea that was – that whole him and Red thing. He stared out over the miles of ocean, trapped out there under the hot island sun.
“On the contrary,” Red murmured into his ear, boxing him up against the side of the boat. “I just have an eye for aesthetics.” The older man pulled delicate fingertips along his pulse before he tucked his face into the crook of Donald’s neck. “And you are quite a pretty boy, Donald.”
He chuckled again, the sound soft and dark as he relaxed against the side of the boat, Red pressing in against him. Donald finally let himself relax into the older man boxing him in, their forms touching firmly as the sharp edge of teeth dragged along the crook of his neck. They shifted together with the bob and rock of the waves kicked up roughly with the motor of the boat, rocking them against one another. It was almost easy to settle into that, into being pinned beneath Red’s weight, held in place, grounded. His attention drifted out over miles of windswept peaks of crystalline water, stirring up waves whipped into silver and gold tipped cerulean. Something tight around the base of his spine relaxed, like settling into undercover work but more instinctual as Donald let himself melt marginally.
Honestly, Stupid should’ve been his middle name – letting himself be lulled into letting his guard down around Raymond Fucking Reddington. By a monster with a silver tongue. Except he’d never been particularly good being anything other than reckless.
And really, he shouldn’t have been surprised as the bungalows rose from the ocean – somehow managing to look basic and extravagant at the same time, as though they were made of roughly hewn bamboo and palm frond, except no way in fuck they were made of reeds and leaves. Missing at least one wall to let the warm ocean breeze in and jutting out into the waves like some sort of gift to man, with gauzy curtains that fluttered out over the waves. And it took everything in him to not openly gape as Donald swallowed hard, clearing his throat before even trying to address that because it sure as fuck looked like a romantic place, and he wasn’t entirely sure that would help him set his priorities straight.
“Okay, so you gave Pantazi shit for his resort being flashy, but you own a goddamn island,” he finally quipped, gaze dragging over each hut they passed – each a carbon copy of the one before it. The bungalows chained into satellites around the main island, something that looked like a fucking mirage in the desert because it was just a little civility stamped into wilderness. A resort carved into the jungle, with sand the color of sugar spilling into ocean clear enough to see straight to the bottom.
“Language, Donald,” Red tutted. But he just shrugged and gestured out over the speedboat’s bow, because it was all essentially a paradise born from cerulean waters. “And can one truly own what is arguably a miracle of nature?”
“Pretty sure that nature didn’t create all of this,” Donald said drily, gesturing at the huts resting out in the brilliant ocean, following the boardwalk of weathered wood with his gaze as the boat slowed. “So, what? You just gonna stick me in one of those huts and peddle diamonds out of the main house up there on the island?”
Surprisingly, he was pretty okay with that thought. What Cooper didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him. Surely Donald had earned a little rest and relaxation, paid out in cool ocean nights and days of hot island sun.
Red chuckled. “Oh, Donald. I plan on spending most of my waking hours in your delightful company,” the other man said with a leer. “And besides, we’re staying elsewhere.”
“Elsewhere,” Donald repeated, because yeah, he burned but he also couldn’t really think of another place he’d rather stay if he were whisked off to the Southern Asia. Not to mention, what was the point of Red dragging them out to somewhere off the Indian Ocean coastline if they weren’t staying on the island paradise where those pesky diamonds had supposedly run off to. “So, you dragged me out here to the Indian Ocean for no reason?”
“We’ll be staying there.”
His gaze followed Red’s gesture where the other man had taken to pointing to what looked like a sailboat that was easily bigger than his childhood home. It was moored to a sun-bleached pier that jutted out into the ocean, hull gleaming in the bright and early sunshine because they’d lost a day somewhere. “On a sailboat,” he drawled.
Beside him, the other man scoffed out an amused sound. “Really, Donald. It’s a luxury catamaran.” Red’s arm wound around his waist. “Sixty feet of a mariner’s wet dream all tidily wrapped up in just over twenty-four hundred feet of the utmost luxurious living space.”
“You Navy guys and your boats,” he huffed out with an eyeroll, begrudgingly amused as Red nipped at his throat roughly before ushering him forward from boat to boardwalk toward yet another pier.
Truly, the catamaran did best with a crew of three or four to captain the vessel and man the sails because there was just something romantic about sailing. The engines, of course, made it more of an acceptable endeavor. As long as Marco unfurled the sails, Red was more than content to just let the ship bob with the tides, occasionally turning the motors on to keep them from drifting too far.
He had more important things to occupy his time with.
Namely, getting the younger man out of his clothing because Donald was certainly wearing too many for an island paradise. And also, maybe a nap given that they had essentially traveled forward in time because it was still the previous day in DC. Hopefully the delightful heat of the boy pressed up against him, pinning him down, warming his bed.
Everything was much the same as when he had commissioned to have the yacht built – burnt cedar and ivory porcelain, softened with smoke colored fabric and washed out with brilliant sunshine. Pity that it no longer held that new build smell, the scent of brine finally having soaked down into the upholstery, not that that truly mattered because Donald looked properly awed as he stepped on board. Though what else had he expected from the youngest son of a disgraced cop from Detroit.
“Jesus, you really just throw money around, huh,” the boy drawled, peering around the main level of the vessel, looking a little cowed.
“Well,” Red quipped, toeing off his shoes before he headed into the galley – though that word really didn’t describe the ship’s kitchen. The space was open, the heart of the main floor as a kitchen should be of a home. “You can’t take it with you, can you.”
“Keen would shit,” Donald said rather bluntly as he bent down to pull off his shoes. Such a shame the boy had sent back those Edward Greens, because the oxblood color would have looked quite fetching with the soft grey of his slacks. “Like, she might just kill me when I tell her. Because I’m definitely rubbing this in her face,” the agent huffed out with a laugh, mouth tugging with a smile characteristic of someone who had grown up with little; a smile Red was intimately familiar with. His chest cinched a little tight, because Donald had given up so much, lost even more and it was hardly fair that the boy had gone from minor annoyance to … whatever he was. Red preferred not to think about that sober.
Donald glanced over at him, expression pulling a little tight. “You do know you don’t have to do this, right,” the boy asked, as though it really needed to be said.
Red laughed brightly, rifling through the kitchen cabinets in search of a lovely bottle of thirty-year-old Macallan aged in sherry oak he just knew he had stashed there the last time he’d visited Mirihi. Couldn’t have been more than five years ago, the island a lovely place to hide out until the heat died down after a miserably botched art heist where a priceless Manet had slipped through his fingers. He didn’t suppose it mattered overmuch, because the Germans had listed the painting as having sunk off the coast of France in a destroyed U-boat following the Second World War. Lost was lost.
“Ah,” he crowed victoriously as his fingers curled around the bottle’s neck, tugging it free from its hiding place behind a couple bottles of Chateau Lafite Rothschilds. “There you are,” Red murmured to the Macallan. He glanced up at Donald with a slight smile. “Donald, I’ve never been a particularly big fan of doing something that doesn’t benefit me.” The boy bit at his bottom lip as Red tugged the cork free from the bottle. “Be a dear and get us some glasses?”
“I mean it, Red,” the younger man continued, even as he went on a dogged search for tumblers. He pulled open cabinets doors until finding heavy cut crystalware. “You don’t have to keep playing pretend that I’m your sugar baby.”
He blinked slowly at the agent before Red sighed, leaning close to the island and pouring them both a rather healthy measure of scotch. “I was unaware that the situation was less than an amicable agreement for the both of us.” He slid Donald’s tumbler over to him as Red folded into the barstool closest to his hip.
“I don’t like thinking that my affection is for sale,” the agent grumbled, ducking his head as he gulped at his scotch.
“Who said affections?”
“So, what? You just wanna keep shoving your dick up my ass and paying me in pretty baubles?”
“Oh,” Red drawled, taking a sip. “I might just settle for a chaste kiss every now and again. Your delightful company on occasion.”
The younger man laughed, the sound soft and bright as it husked out of his chest, his attention firmly on his glass as Donald leaned against the island counter. “You’re so full of shit,” Donald murmured softly, his head ducking down as he sipped at his drink.
“On the contrary,” Red huffed out, leaning back as he regarded the younger man. “I just happen to think that the loyal youth deserve adequate payment for their sacrifice?”
Donald huffed out another amused sound, looking up at Red blearily. “I went willingly into this.”
“And what is this,” Red laughed out, giving the agent a look. “You chasing the devil across the map for supposed justice? Sacrificing everything for a futile cause? Finding yourself at my mercy regardless?” Donny’s jaw clenched before he swallowed the rest of his drink. Red watched the bob of the boy’s throat perhaps overly hard before he smiled sharply. “My darling boy, I’ve been indulging in you for far longer than you’ve any idea.”
“Oh yeah? Like what,” Donald scoffed.
“Like before Brussels,” he returned with a pointed look.
“Fucking Brussels,” the boy murmured, his breath huffing out of his chest with a headshake before Donald dumped the rest of his drink past his teeth. The tumbler thumped down loudly against the counter as Donald shot him a look. “You gonna take me to bed or what,” the younger man asked, his pretty mouth twisting derisively at the corner. Something hot coiled tightly in his gut at that, but still Red swallowed down another mouthful of his drink. He forced a laugh.
“A nap would be delightful, wouldn’t it,” he quipped as he dumped the rest of his drink into his mouth.
“A nap,” Donald questioned, his mouth crumpling marginally as Red offered up a sharper smile.
“Darling boy,” Red drawled. “No matter how I find you in my bed, it’s always going to be a delight.”
The agent huffed out an amused sound before he dumped the rest of his drink past his teeth. “Okay, take me to bed then,” Donald quipped, his mouth cutting into a sharp slash of a smile.
Red tried to swallow down that demand as he led the agent down the steps and paused. Because to the left was the owner’s cabin, and to the right was a much smaller one, and while he knew where he would prefer the boy sleep, forcing Donald into his bed was very low on the list of things Red was hoping to do to the younger man. The boy already thought him to be a monster in the utmost sense, and for whatever reason Red wasn’t too eager to prove him correct. To his credit, Donald just huffed and pressed past Red, presumably with an eyeroll while he grumbled something about jetlag. Red still lingered in the doorway, watching Donald drop his bag before he started shedding clothes. Shirt gone, the agent’s fingers stilled on the fly of his trousers as he glanced over at Red, looking a little unsure.
“You did want me to sleep in here, right?”
“I will always readily welcome your delightful company in my bed, Donald,” he drawled, gaze dragging hotly along the agent’s bared chest, the long line of his back as he pushed his trousers down, the twist of his frame as Donald peeled off his socks. "To sleep or to fuck."
“Bet you say that to all the boys,” Donald quipped, finally stripped down to his underwear – delightful little things. Black and bold against the younger man’s pale skin like a demand for attention. Red let his gaze drag hotly along the swell of Donald’s rear as the boy padded over to the bed, a wonderful display of human musculature.
“Only the pretty ones,” he returned with a sharp leer. Donald snorted in amusement as he climbed onto the bed, threw himself back in the sheets. Red was beginning to believe that the agent looked best in his bed, whichever bed, on whatever soil just so long as it was his. The lovely boy stretched in the sheets, his spine uncurling as he shifted in the bedcovers, relaxing tiredly into the fabric.
“Yeah? Well, this pretty boy wants a nap. Nineteen hours on that fucking jet …"
“Language, darling,” Red murmured softly as he stripped off his vest and shirt, pulling his tie free from his neck before his hands dropped to his fly. And honestly, his clothing deserved better than to be dumped to the floor in a heap of fabric, but also there was a delightful younger man in his bed. It was funny how quickly things became trivial when there was lovely company to be had. Stripped down to his undershirt and briefs, Red managed to find a pair of thin linen pants before he climbed slowly into bed, sheets rustling quietly as he situated himself. Donald hummed and after a moment’s hesitation, backed into his space. While the boy didn’t throw his arm across Red’s chest, his form folded against the curve of Red’s side like he belonged there.
For a breathless moment, he just laid there in surprise – wonders what a little human contact would do. Because the agent had happened upon the wreckage that Red often wrought; the boy had bled because of Red, for Red, and it hardly seemed fitting for the devil’s keeper to seek the comfort of touch from the devil himself. But the younger man just settled against him, body curving to keep them in contact without anything overtly sexual between them. Red hummed softly, half curving over the younger man to pin him to the sheets, his nose buried in the boy's hair as his palm smoothed along his back.