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Sunday is going to be the death of him.
“Sunday.” Gallagher minds his voice, soft and candid, for he wants to treat his little dove well. He does, and is trying. “Look at me, angel.”
Pin-up nose, pride-coloured expression, unbothered, and insufferable, Sunday still says nothing, looking out of the window.
If Gallagher were a worse man, he would bring the little dove forward by the collar of his designer shirt and slam him face-forward on the balcony, gripping the back of his pallid neck until it becomes a saddened red, hard-to-miss and even harder to scrub away. He would keep him there until he begged for forgiveness or Gallagher decided he was too annoyed to waste his time on bending the impossible stones.
His fingers itch to force that doll's face to look at him instead of the raindrops hitting the window.
While never considering himself a good man either, Gallagher still knows he is better than at least a few who would enjoy putting a bullet between Sunday’s head and thinking twice about ravishing what’s left. It is a very thin, very fragile line between lust and hatred—no man can fault another for harbouring both at the same time for Sunday.
Who would deny the chance to force the heir of the Oak Family on his knees and see how long he lasts?
They are in public, and worse men would have bent Sunday bare over the balcony and mounted him as less than a beast just to prove a point.
Gallagher does none of that.
Sunday does not stare at him even though Gallagher so gently requested him to do so, there remaining, ignoring his keeper as if he is less than a bother and an annoyance. Not enough to scratch him in any way. It is silent, go on, what will you do? Lock me up? Again?
As if he, at this point of their unnamable relationship, still doesn’t believe Gallagher will have him closed off from the world until a simple word of remorse is uttered.
“I can’t help you if you tell me nothing, angel,” says Gallagher, lowering his voice and leaning so his lips linger to bite Sunday’s earlobe. It would hurt if he gave in; Sunday’s earlobe has ornate, fine, delicate piercings along its curvature and ends with a beautiful, long silver earring. Sunday never admits it, but he enjoys it when Gallagher bites it and threatens to pull it out with his teeth. Not that he will act on it now. “You love using words and hearing your own voice, darling—why do you act like this?”
The bar is buzzing with life. The patrons are hardly friendly despite the excited, lively aura of the establishment, but such is the price when you visit foul places where angels fear to tread. Sunday is the exception.
The sickly sweet smell of alcohol mixed with the bitter smoking drugs, piss and copper should have scared the angel out of it, never to return to the neighbourhood or even the city itself, fearing for his life with reasonable panic. Every single person in the bar—the vices’ quarters overall—would gut him and have fun while doing it.
But Sunday hides it all under the veil of pristine confidence and seraphic presence. Untouchable, it would seem.
Gallagher would agree if he had not been touching said being every night.
And his patience is running thin.
“Let me make a deal with you, then,” murmurs Gallagher, picking up a cigarette and lighting it with his match—not caring for Sunday’s grimace and slight whimper at the puff of smoke when he continues, “Behave. Do that, I’ll take you to buy more diamonds. Especially trimmed for you under your preferences, the way you want it, all pretty,” like you, but the last part he hardly needs to utter it. The way his knuckles brush against Sunday’s cheeks is enough. “Not a bad reward, is it?”
It would be perfect for both of them, indeed. As much as Gallagher would choke Sunday until he is left forever voiceless, until the collar is the angry marks of fingertips surrounding the pale neck, dolling him up is slightly better. Everyone is happier when Sunday is content and pliant.
“Look at me, angel,” Gallagher tries one more time. His patience is not limitless, and it is frustrating that Sunday knows it.
Sunday gives him nothing.
Gallagher closes his eyes and brings the cigarette to his lips, inhaling as much as his rotten lungs can. Trust nicotine to be well-behaved instead of his task. “Alright, then.”
The fingers that were gentle now turn into stone, grabbing Sunday’s chin taut and ignoring how the little dove attempts to squirm away from the dancing smoke from his cigarette, so close to burning his skin.
Much better.
Before their eyes meet, Sunday closes his, breathing deeply, no doubt trying not to raise his voice or start a fight in public. No one should know they are there—no, no one should know Sunday is there.
“I should tell you what will happen if you don’t behave, I suppose,” muses Gallagher, not daring to go above a whisper or expose the anger. Soft and kind, even if meant for an execution. “Needless to say, but you won’t get new jewels. I was planning on us to enjoy a nice dinner and then take care of you.” Gallagher meticulously planned for them to have a calm, teasing evening, fingerfuck Sunday in the car during the ride-back, and fuck him in the high gloss black bathtub of the hotel suite. Disappointing that they will not do any of that now. “Misbehave, and I’ll have someone to put their mouth on you.”
Gallagher loathes the mere idea of someone else even looking at Sunday, but the angel himself surpasses him on the matter, and if the low, sharp inhale Sunday gives him. The way his body tenses in a shivering shock, Gallagher knows he will follow through it if needed, if only out of spite. He can make up to Sunday afterwards, getting rid of whoever lays a hand on him.
“I’m feeling nice, though,” continues Gallagher, brushing his thumb against Sunday’s lips. “I’ll let you choose, sweetheart. Let you pick whoever you want in here. A small mercy, isn’t it?”
If it were up to Sunday, not even Gallagher would have ever touched him. He would have let Gallagher stare, and stare, and stare, and yearn and taunt him as the unreachable being some fucked-up scriptures of that fucking pastor that once took care of him—Sunday was never meant to be anyone else’s but God, according to the pastor. Another reason why Gallagher’s presence was needed.
But Sunday still does not look at him. Gallagher sees the tremors, how the long eyelashes flutter even when Sunday keeps his eyesight closed to the rest of the world, and the firm press of his lips, which are never cracked or hurt.
“If you don’t choose,” whispers Gallagher, breathing against Sunday’s ear. “I will do it for you. And I won’t be nice about it.”
It is not that Sunday is fearless. A bird that preferred to remain in the cage and allow his paranoia to rule him would never be considered such. It is that when Sunday takes a deep breath and slowly opens his eyes, lashes still fluttering and gaze steering from Gallagher’s, swallowing under his hold—no, it is not fearlessness.
“There you go, angel,” praises Gallagher, but with no real pampering intent. “Not so hard, was it?”
Sunday needs control.
Doe-eyed, fair-haired, the perfect face for a cult. Who could ever resist joining the Family, knowing Sunday would be there, the realest angel these ordinary people would ever see? No wonder Gopher Wood, the parish leader, had to hide him away from the threat of war against the IPC.
If only the pastor knew he put Sunday in worse hands.
“Why do we have to do this every time, dove?” Gallagher’s weakness will forever be how Sunday’s eyes shine with unshed tears that sparkle not out of fear but rage. It is because of them he fell on his knees more than once, giving into the angel’s whims. “I could treat you much, much better if you just let me do my job.”
Sunday lifts his chin, arrogant and proud, hiding the grimace with a wavering smile. “Poor me, a victim in the hands of the big, bad wolf,” he mocks, or tries to—Gallagher finds it amusing. “And here I thought you were meant to protect me from the bad men out there, Hound.”
“You know they wouldn’t think twice about cutting your head off and putting it on a spike,” says Gallagher, inhaling enough nicotine to ephemerally calm his nerves, the need to force Sunday more than he will now. “Maybe fucking it before exposing it, just for the sake of ruination.”
“You’re right,” admits Sunday, not without a shuddering breath he tries to hide by steeling himself. From porcelain, to ivory, to stone. “I bet someone in here would pay all the cash they do not possess just to have a go at me. Should we tell them I am here?” They both know Sunday does not want that—but oh, they are willing to endure if it is for the other’s empirical nightmare. “I should pick the nastiest looking man and pretend he is you, but better.”
“Then I pick the most pathetic whore in here and fuck her mouth while thinking of you.” Gallagher cannot resist the smirk when Sunday widens his eyes and shuts any clever remark, no upper hand worthy of exposing. How fitting of him—willing to disgrace himself to torment Gallagher. “Come on, angel—we don’t need to do this tonight.”
“You have yourself to blame,” Sunday murmurs. His tone is quiet, but the hatred is felt.
Gallagher chooses silence for once but never diverts his attention from Sunday, whose molten gold gaze slowly turns darker and darker. He knows those words are not a lie—Gallagher only needed to disclose one piece of information for Sunday to remain happy and satisfied the whole night, Hell, the whole month, but preferred to give him nothing. Truthfully, it is for the best. There is a reason Sunday and his sister were separated, and far be it from cruelty.
Sunday knows this a little too well and still chooses to throw a tantrum like a child.
“Behave, angel,” and Sunday may not realise this, but it is a plea. “I’m just doing my job. No need for us to make it a living hell.”
“You think of your cruelty as kindness,” says Sunday, at last. Then, he takes a deep breath and does not blink, but he offers the most disappointed, most taunting smile a manipulative angel could give. “I think I made a terrible choice when I chose you that night. Woolsey would’ve treated me better.”
And Sunday lets out a voiceless whimper when Gallagher grabs his throat.
His hands—so lithe, well-kept and bloodless, fingers adorned with sapphire and crystals—fly to hold Gallagher’s wrist, attempting to remove the chokehold, but with no success whatsoever. Gallagher’s hold comes from decades of turmoil and getting rid of corpses, finishing the job the elite would never bother themselves to personally deal with, so below their station. Gallagher’s hold is too close to breaking stones since he cannot bend them, and his hand wraps around Sunday’s throat with too much ease, too big to offer any relief.
“Don’t use that one,” says Gallagher, extinguishing the cigarette on top of the balcony. The bar is so ill-reputed and lowly-frequented that the surface has been used and misused; the burnt mark will never stand out. “As you said, that was your choice, birdie. Don’t turn this on me when you put yourself in this situation.”
“Don’t call me that,” hisses Sunday, piercing Gallagher’s skin until it bleeds. “I never asked to be in this.”
No, you didn’t ask to be hidden away and run from city to city to escape the eyes of the IPC, to be separated from your sister. Gallagher concurs.
However, sternly but not unkindly, and removing Sunday’s fingers from his wrist and holding them in one hand, he says, “But you came to me so sweetly, demanding I kill others for you. And that I did.” One too many times, never thought twice. Gallagher will effortlessly get rid of whoever Sunday wished to be gone. It is what keeps them together, after all. “No turning back now, angel, be careful with your words. My patience won’t last too long.”
“I will not apologise when it is your fault, Hound.” Sunday’s eyes are beginning to shimmer more and more, turning into glass. “I ask you a simple thing, and you cannot offer me it, but you will come with heads and blood in your hands. Common men would find it twisted.”
“At this point, you should’ve known I lost most of my humanity a long, long time ago, birdie.”
Which is why it was so easy to get rid of Woolsey when Sunday, all pretty and untouchable in his modest nightgown, came to him in the dead of night the moment news of his departure was announced. There was only so much he could do to have a pathetic amount of power and control when all was settled without his knowledge—let him have the decision on who would be his bloodhound until no threat was close enough to reach him.
Gallagher might have become something akin to a soulless monster, but whatever is left, good or bad, belongs to Sunday and no one else.
“Don’t call me that…” Sunday is now gasping for air, even if the choking is not tight enough to deprive him of air. It will leave marks, no doubt, but he finds it fitting alongside the crystal-laced rosary. “You insufferable, vulgar mutt—”
“You know what to do to end this, Sunday.” Something so easy and yet so hard to obtain. “I hate when you use that nickname.”
Sunday huffs, rolling his eyes. One tear is escaping from the corner of his eye, trailing down his cheek.
“Go on, angel,” says Gallagher. At least, this one nickname is more likely to receive a nod, a confirmation, something good. “Just this once.”
Because, truthfully, Sunday has never done it. It is always Hound, mutt, fucker, and any variation he can find in the holy book and apocryphal texts.
He gets nothing.
Even when he slightly tightens the hold around Sunday’s neck, even when he tilts the boy’s head backwards to gaze at him better, even when gently caresses the willowy wrists—he gets nothing. Sunday has the heated regard only heavenly fire would possess, the pride and untouchable superiority that no degradation could break through.
Gallagher sighs and lets go of Sunday’s throat.
It would be a lie to say that it is not pleasing to hear the sound the boy lets escape when Gallagher finally ceases to choke him. Not exactly a whimper, but a soft realisation of breathing, low and relieved, smooth and nimble. Fingerprints now portray a necklace, and Gallagher knows they are burning for Sunday. He touches his throat carefully and opens his mouth, but no coherent word comes out if not mellow hisses. Such a contrast that he wishes it had been done under better circumstances instead of Sunday pissing him off.
“Suit yourself,” says Gallagher after a long time, getting up. His lips beg to have something between them, be it to chew on, smoke or force his tongue down into. He eyes the used cigarette resting atop the balcony and curses himself; that was the last one of the batch he bought yesterday. Something else, then.
The bar is still too lively for the reputation of its people—men and women of disesteem and ill-fame gamble, drink and whore to their tastes, and that goes without counting the drug deals and death threats no doubt occurring in the backrooms. It takes one panoramic view, and Gallagher decides.
“What are you doing?” Sunday’s voice comes out rough despite its douceur—but that is Gallagher’s opinion and no one else’s. Sunday frowns as Gallagher removes his jacket and drapes it over the boy’s shoulders. It is almost comical how slack it looks, oversized and billowing.
“I’m going to find someone to fuck.” It would be funny to smirk at Sunday’s widened stare when these words come out of his vulgar mutt’s mouth, but Gallagher has lost any amusement in him. He was truly planning on spending the evening with Sunday. “You, on the other hand, have a not-so-nice choice at your disposal.”
Sunday is seething at this point. “You cannot leave me here.”
“Do as you please, Sunday, but I need to quell my stress,” and my need to take you by force, “so your options are simple—announce yourself to everyone in here and see how far they go with you or stay pliant and quiet for half an hour.”
“I can leave you for good, bastard,” Sunday grits his teeth while tugging Gallagher’s jacket.
And Gallagher nods without a single hesitation, doubtful and devoid of humour. Sunday knows better than that—Gallagher has the best subordinates at each entrance and exit of the building. “Good luck with that.” No one is getting in, and no one is getting out.
“It’s your job to watch over me, you filthy mutt,” curses Sunday, not caring for how his voice is beginning to rasp, bordering on a manic state. Dammed cultists when all goes wrong. “You can’t possibly leave me. You can’t.”
…the worst is that Sunday is right. In parts, that is.
Gallagher smiles tiredly and searches his trousers pockets for cash and coins. Without saying another word, he leaves the change on the balcony and turns, not looking back to see the despair on Sunday’s face.
Sunday might get thirsty. What kind of keeper would Gallagher be if he left his care in need?
Every time Gallagher finds another mouth to warm his cock, he can only close his eyes and think of Sunday. The whores can act as virgins and inexperienced all they want, but there is always that malicious, knowing look that tells him they are good at what they do.
Sunday’s charm is that he is not, in the slightest, good at it.
Gallagher spends himself in the whore’s mouth and cunt, only to steal a lost cigarette on the way back and think of how to appease Sunday the moment they return to the hotel.
He feels particularly filthy, and for once, he wonders if this is how Sunday feels every time they fuck. Gallagher never cared for it all, and truth be told—living the life he owns, sex is the least of his problems when blood on his hands became the norm and drugs in his system are way easier to deal with since they have no mouth and cannot complain if they are done too roughly. Sex works when, all in all, Gallagher wants to pretend he is not there.
So he ignores the way men and women mount each other in the corridors and open rooms as he leaves the bar, descends the stairs where kisses and drugs are being exchanged with the same passion, and, after seeing no sign of a fair angel amid the patrons and problematic crowd, he leaves from the establishment’s back door.
No sign of his subordinates anywhere means his charge has left. Good, he thinks, but he would have enjoyed seeing Sunday uncomfortable and silently begging to run away.
The alley is not any better: foul-smelling, he is lucky he can ignore the odour of piss and copper alongside diesel and the sickly fresh water falling from the pipes. In the time he abandoned Sunday and went upstairs, the rain stopped, though the air is still chilling to the bone. Gallagher ignores the fallen drunkard—dead or asleep, he couldn’t care less—and thinks of what awaits him.
“I trust he gave you some trouble,” he muses as he approaches the car and Siobhan, the designated driver.
“Ah, not at all, actually, sir.”
Gallagher raises his eyebrows in surprise. “Really? He was being feisty in there.” I expected worse.
But Siobhan shrugs, walking around the car and opening the driver’s door. “Guess he got tired, boss.”
Tired is not the word Gallagher would use when he gets in the car in the back passenger seat, closing the door with no ceremonies and finding Sunday coiled within his jacket, uptight and seemingly unaffected if not for the puffy and rosy eyes, erected spine and fidgeting hands above his lap. If Gallagher knows anything about the jailed bird of the Family, it is that Sunday will be harming himself in the smallest, unperceptive ways—so when he fetches Sunday’s wrist and turns on the car’s lights, he is not surprised to see the damaged skin around the nails, failing pieces of skin that they know it will be pulled by teeth.
“I thought you stopped doing this,” says Gallagher. Sunday does not look at him, unsurprisingly, and the bodyguard sighs in disappointment as he frees the wrist from his hold, sensing the boy would begin to squirm in quietness if he didn’t. “You won’t get much if you keep inflicting pain on yourself.”
“It forbids me from doing something worse as harming others, you ignorant mutt,” replies Sunday as he turns the lights off. The car starts to run, and he returns to look at the raindrop-stained window.
Under the poor light and neon colours of the district outside, Gallagher can recognise little details that both cause him to smirk and his heart to falter: how the dry tears shine differently on his cheek when compared to the rest of the skin, how his eyelashes bring little shadows to decorate his demeanour, how his pale hair turns colourful, even if in saddening shades. Sunday has always been too enchanting for mortals, either way. No wonder Gopher Wood prioritises his safety over his sister’s.
Sunday would pick up the nearest knife and gut him like a pig if he ever knew of it.
So Gallagher chooses silence. His cigarette is still lit, burning low and bothering with its bitter smell, and he is aware his companion would throw him out of the car if he still had any control over the situation. How he still doesn’t know he’s his Hound’s trigger— a mystery, thinks Gallagher, because it is terribly apparent.
“You smell foul.”
Gallagher leans against the car’s door, not caring for the excessive space his legs occupy in the name of spite. “There’s a really nice bathtub waiting to be used,” he says, and then Sunday viciously turns to him, lips tainted with a promise of curse and threats. “You don’t smell nice either, sweetheart. Maybe you could make good use of it.”
“On me rests smoke—from your distasteful vices—and nothing more than rain,” hisses Sunday, tugging his keeper’s jacket tighter around himself. It is still baggy on him, more akin to a poor blanket under the indigent light. “You smell of cheap cunts and booze.”
The way Sunday speaks, it almost seems as if Gallagher whored until no one was spared. Maybe once, many years ago, that could have happened. “You know I wouldn’t have done it if you behaved properly.”
“You would have done it regardless because it is your fault I gave you no satisfaction. And I will still give you none.”
Heeding his own words, Sunday turns to glare at the windows instead of the perpetrator of his distress.
Maybe Gallagher needs another type of fire; the burning nicotine is not enough to satiate the hunger that Sunday nurtures little by little with his antics. Who will ever live up to the challenge to entertain Gallagher and the dullness he faces daily, who finds nothing interesting enough and never truly defies him in hardships, if not for Sunday and the ever-lingering paranoias inside his pretty head? It is enjoyable to prove his delusions incorrect—or turn them into worse nightmares, that as well. So much depends on the mood.
He slides closer to Sunday, who stiffens in place but gives, as heeded, no satisfaction or recognition. “You know it brings me no joy to dishearten you, angel. I would’ve enjoyed being in you much more than anyone else.” Being a bastard has always been more challenging for him, and yet, when it comes to Sunday, it feels natural. He is also certain Gopher Wood used to talk this way with his young priest—maybe not the same content, but no doubt the same sweetness. Jailed birds want comfort. “It was punishment, dove, and you didn’t even care to apologise. We know how this works.”
“Then you know you can already hire a personal whore since it will happen again.” Sunday grits his teeth and keeps on tormenting his own hands between his thighs, away from anyone’s sight. His fingers must be bleeding by now. “If you think I’ll spread my legs for you after this shameful display, this traitorous behaviour…”
They both know he will, eventually. Too broken from the rigorous teachings of the Family, and too devoid of comfort if not in his sister's arms, Sunday will come back guilt-ridden and searching for absolution. “For now, I just want you to let me take care of you,” because that is true, despite all the sinful and blasphemous acts that come with it.
Gallagher cannot always lie, but he can be Sunday’s only anchor.
Gopher Wood should have never left his protegé in the hands of a bloodhound.
Sunday has a very precise aim, and Gallagher has less than a second to turn before the vase hits his head, instead smashing against the door of the hotel luxury suite.
Gallagher should have picked up another box of cigarettes on his way back. “Don’t break the hotel’s propriety, angel.”
While Sunday remained silent the whole ride back, not even fighting when Gallagher guided him towards the hotel entrance hall and the elevator with a hand on the small of his back, it did not last long. Gallagher attempted to calm him, for he looked too small in his jacket and curled in himself, and caressed him with touches on his hip the whole way until they reached the hotel suite.
The moment Gallagher closed the door, however, it took less than a second for Sunday to pick up the first object and throw it at his head.
Look at us, playing the married couple, jokes Gallagher in his head, for he does not dare to utter it out loud when his pretty dove wants his organs served on a feast at the end of his fasting. The broken pieces of the vase will crack someone’s feet on the morrow. They cannot have that.
“We won’t be staying here, anyway,” hisses Sunday, picking up yet another vase. Gallagher sighs as he steps aside, not looking at the expensive broken pieces of the ornament he must pay for when they check out.
“Are you truly going to freak out now?” Gallagher begins to stalk Sunday as the latter moves further and further away, and soon, they dance around the living room’s furniture as Sunday continues to throw away the first objects he can find. “You could have done it at the bar, sweetheart; you had more chances at infuriating me if you did the same.”
Sunday has no more breakable and potentially harmful objects to throw, so he goes for the pillows. “Or what? You’ll call up some harlots and fuck them right here on this divan? Or maybe you’ll take them to the bed where I sleep because you have no sense of decorum!”
This time, Gallagher catches mid-air the pillow thrown at him, and in a quick step, he leans over the divan’s back, swiftly catching Sunday by the wrists. “You’re acting like a child.”
His little dove has to kneel on the divan’s cushion so as not to fall forward, and he hates it by the expression of rage. “You have no right!” Sunday tries, tries and tries to get free. “Let go of me, you bastard—”
“Or, perhaps, not a child, but a scandalised wife,” and when Gallagher says that with a too-soft lift of lips, Sunday momentarily stops squirming in his grasp, which is enough time for the bodyguard to bring him forward by both wrists and keep him there, locked in his hold. “You know better than I do that I would bring no harlot to this room nor any other that’s yours.”
“Don’t you ever call me that again,” rasps Sunday, tensing in Gallagher’s grip.
And Gallagher, as the bastard he is, tilts his head. “What, wife?”
Sunday would have slapped him if his hands were free, Gallagher knows—he keeps writhing in his keeper’s hold even when he knows it is useless to get what he wants. Now, though, he groans and tries to jerk away with no success.
“I’d never take you as my husband, you disgusting, filthy—”
“What a shame,” muses Gallagher, unbothered by how Sunday still shifts his wrists in his palms. “I would take you as my wife. I’d never have to look for anyone else but my dearest spouse—isn’t that a victory for you, angel?”
“I couldn’t care less for what you would or wouldn’t like, dog.”
It is disappointing. Gallagher closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, then scoffs. “It’s not what it looks like when you flip your lid like this. Lying is a sin, birdie. Let’s not do that.”
“I’m—I’m not lying—!” Sunday’s distress may come from deeper roots that Gallagher will pretend he knows nothing about. Lying is a sin, and sinners are punished. “If anything, it’s you the liar. It’s your fault. You know I would’ve kept quiet and not given you a hard time if you just didn’t lie to me about Robin.”
“Birdie…”
“Don’t call me that.”
“I can’t tell you anything because I know you very well. I know what you will do the moment you hear of her.”
At that, Sunday says nothing, but his anger never falters nor pacifies. He looks away, no longer trusting a state competition with the man is worth it, but Gallagher can see how the molten gold becomes more glossy each second, and when Sunday blinks, he sees a single tear run down his cheek.
Gallagher relieves the tight grip around the lithe wrists, no longer squirming in his hold, and brings a palm to cradle Sunday’s cheek, thumb brushing under his eyes, and he is glad that, at least now, Sunday does not move away from his touch.
“I hate seeing you like this, angel,” he whispers, taking the opportunity of Sunday’s lowered guard to touch the curve of his waist under the jacket. Sunday indeed needs a bath, but more out of habit than true disgust—he smells of rain and bittersweet smoke, passively enchanted by it, and now he has the scented leather from Gallagher’s jacket mixing with his own. How could Gallagher resist bringing him closer? “You know we can forgive each other and move past this. We’ve done it before. I hate being the cause of your pain, but I hate even more when you’re the cause of mine.”
“Not only an arrogant bastard, but selfish, too,” murmurs Sunday. He presses his lips and swallows dry and loud, inhaling deep before speaking, meek and more pathetic than ever, “I just want my sister back. Why can’t I be with her?”
Because if one heir falls, the other will be safe and have time to escape. “You know why, darling. You cannot keep throwing a tantrum every time we return to this conversation, or else we will not get better.”
It never does. Gallagher will omit information for Sunday’s sake, and Sunday—beautiful, beautifully maddening, hysteria-inducing Sunday—will harm the heavens and the earth to guarantee Robin is safe and sound despite being oceans away. Gallagher cannot risk Gopher Wood’s heir to escape to seek his sister, not when both have targets on their backs.
The more selfish reason Gallagher keeps it close to his heart.
“You cannot keep me in the dark forever,” says Sunday, regarding the bodyguard with the coldest look. “I will know where she is.”
“You will, one day. Not today, nor tomorrow or next week. This is the life we will be living for a good, long time, angel.” They can never truly stay anywhere, for Sunday’s dismay. The jailed bird aches for warmth, familiarity, and a trustable corner where it can rest. The runaway life can never pacify it, regardless of the luxury offered. “For now, be a darling and let me care for you. We don’t need to hurt each other anymore tonight.”
Gallagher can pamper him the whole night from dusk to dawn, dawn to dusk. They will finally use that charming bathtub just waiting to have Sunday bent over its edge, holding on for dear life while Gallagher fucks him better than anyone ever will, and hopefully see that they ruin the expensive charcoal sheets, where Sunday will look stunning on top of it as he cries and moans with his legs spread and cunt full. For being so good, Gallagher will get him more jewels, one more stunning than the other in a plethora of gems, and they will still look nothing compared to Sunday’s bruised throat and waist, sore thighs and nipples.
They can pretend all is fine until their next disastrous fight.
“Or what if I don’t listen to you?” But before Gallagher can let out an exasperated sigh, Sunday continues, venom slipping his lips, “You’ll lock me here until you say otherwise, like in the Reverie?”
“I have no problem chaining you by the ankles if needed. Make a prisoner out of you for the sake of your protection.” But his little dove has punished himself enough for today, he thinks. Gallagher brushes a few hairs out of Sunday’s fair face and locks them behind his ear, then leans forward and kisses his forehead in a graceful, chaste message of care. “Be good for me, will you?”
Gallagher feels he can finally breathe when he notices Sunday’s composure going from stiff to slacking, shoulders falling, and head dropping in what could both be shame and defeat, letting his bodyguard pull him closer and kiss his tear-dried cheek. Sunday will forgive him. Gallagher has the whole night to make up for it.
Then, Sunday looks up at him from under his eyelashes, offers a tiny, timid smile and lets Gallagher tilt his chin so their lips meet—
“Did you make a prisoner out of Mikhail, too, before he abandoned you?”
Gallagher freezes in place.
His hand flies towards Sunday’s neck for a second time that night.
“A-Ah…” Sunday is smiling, though—not the way he was earlier, with a mockery that would be put down like a rebel dog, but a beam, satisfied and content, even if in malice and utter cruelty. “You did it, didn’t you…”
“We don’t go there.” Gallagher can feel himself snarling, hardening his grip around the angel’s throat, eyes turning red with wrath. It was a silent agreement to never talk about him.
“Why?” Sunday chuckles and tears up, and Gallagher can feel the painful swallow under his palm. “Did he fight you?”
Gallagher slams him down on the divan while containing the urge to jump over the furniture and cover him wholly, suffocating him with no room for his limbs to squirm. “We were about to forgive each other, angel.”
“Were we?”
We were, Gallagher wants to snarl, but he just tightens his hold around that already-marked throat and grunts. He should rip off that crystal-made rosary hanging from Sunday’s neck, resting above his ribs; its shine is a jest towards the bloodhound.
They were supposed to get on the divan and fuck until the first light. Had Sunday not opened his mouth, if not to moan and sing beautifully, Gallagher would be parting those pale legs and be balls-deep into this hierophantic creature that was obviously made to be pampered and forever-filled. Gallagher’s jacket looks so good on him—it should be him or his clothes, nothing else to cover this heaven-sent perfection.
“Did Mikhail obey you faithfully?” But the same heaven-sent creature manages to stare down at him despite being laid down, reduced into a crying little thing, despite losing in a fair fight, flesh-on-flesh, and the creature is just as cruel as a hellhound. “Maybe he was tired of his dog rebelling so many times, even when on a leash.”
“Don’t.”
“Oh, poor thing, you,” laughs Sunday, caressing Gallagher’s stone-turned knuckles as if they are not depriving him of much of his air, as if those fingers are not so grand in comparison to his throat they could break it right there. “In the end, you’re an abandoned puppy, still missing the hand that fed you. Mikhail, Mikha—ah!”
Sunday gasps, pale countenance slowly turning into a horrifying rose, a red of desperation, and Gallagher needs to break something. His throat is just here.
“Did—Did you want to put a leash on him?” Sunday’s voice is a whisper so dry and harsh that it cannot be anything but pathetic. The upper hand, however, still feels his. “Keep him shackled. Ah-ah… you did… I know you did… no wonder he… he left you…”
Gallagher lets him go before he does something that cannot be forgiven. When he abandons Sunday, who painfully retakes the air left, he cannot look at him. Not now, not when his chest aches with the cruel knife twisted between his ribs.
…he has always known Sunday was cruel. It is something else to have this cruelty directed towards him.
A seraphic voice rasps behind him, “I’m going to bathe myself first. I don't want to smell your remnants when I cleanse mine.”
And when Gallagher looks back, he finds no one on the divan beside his jacket thrown over its arm.
The first time Gallagher sees Sunday, the Holy Virgin Mother stares back at him as if she knows all the malicious things wandering his mind at seeing his angel kneeling before him.
All the parishioners have gone home leaving behind burning candles, wordless prayers and regrets that will be forgiven in no time by their so-beloved priest, their veil between eternal damnation and salvation. The church smells of frankincense and sanctified oil, the slight odour of olives and probably-not-so-holy water, and the lights are slowly giving into the darkness of the evening, with almost no sun to shine on the coloured glass with biblical figures.
There is a faint whisper, hushed unintelligible words being sung, and Gallagher knows he has found the object he was paid to keep safe.
His steps are slow on the long, straight red carpet of the church, almost inaudible, and he prefers it that way—the last thing he wants is to scare the little dove praying so hard, so faithfully at the foot of the altar, unaware that he is no longer only in the company of God. Gallagher silently sits in one of the front rows of benches, legs spread and arms playing with the lit cigarette. In no time, the smell will spread alongside candles and oils, and Gopher Wood’s heir will notice him.
Before it happens, however, Gallagher pays attention to how the heir’s hair becomes rose-silver under the light of the fire, pale gold when reflected on the sublime stained glass above them with the remaining sun rays that will disappear in a few minutes. He wants to see how the hair would feel in his hands, between his fingers, and how it would look when he grabs a fistful of opalescent threads and pulls. He wants to see if the body shines as beautifully, too.
And the angel looks up when he starts wondering about the arch of this creature’s back and if his whimpers will sound as good as the hushed prayers. Gallagher follows the motion of his shoulders as he sighs and makes sure not to blink when the boy turns and finally meets his keeper.
Gopher Wood’s heir is anything less than stunning. Still, he is, perhaps, overprotected, for he reveals his genuine emotions for a second only—the little intake of air, the unimportant swallow, and the quick up-and-down look he gives the new visitor is enough to give away he has yet to be aware of how things will dance from now on.
Oh, Gallagher has to resist a chuckle, he doesn’t know why I’m here.
“May I help you?” The angel speaks as a more appealing and compassionate version of the pastor—quiet and alluring, like a true heavenly being depicted by painters instead of the biblically accurate horror. His eyes, though—gold, the one molten for crowns and relics adorning their dead under the basilicas—narrow and pierce Gallagher as fire. Fitting.
Gallagher decides that the cigarette has done its job and extinguishes it on the bench’s wood, not minding at all for the sharp regard he is being given at the act. “You’re Sunday, right?” He knows he is right, but what kind of gentleman would he be if he didn’t smooth his way into the little dove’s trust? “The pastor’s pupil. They call you the Bronze Melody for your time in the choir.”
“An unfitting title, if you ask me, but I shall not be arrogant nor humble enough to question their choices of nicknames.” As far as Gallagher’s intel has told him, the real singing bird is his sister, Robin. Sunday supports himself on the altar and gets up, ignorant of how his new visitor is quietly cursing the loss of a nice view of his body on its knees. “Do you seek to confess?”
“I’m afraid to confess I’d have to be repentant and regretful of my actions,” admits Gallagher, getting up and meeting Sunday at the foot of the podium. It is not a bad view to see the angel above him, though his mind flies to other kinds of positions.
“A heretic, then.” Sunday huffs, hand behind his back. The altar behind him plays with the simulacrum of a halo if the priest does not look holy enough. “Have you ever listened to His word?”
“I don’t exactly care about that,” says Gallagher, this time not containing the smirk that makes its way up to his lips.
Sunday is far from amused or charmed. “Then you will find nothing here to keep you entertained. Unless you require refuge, I suggest you turn around and leave from the door you entered. I still wish you the blessings.”
“No can do, I’m afraid.” When Gallagher finds his body standing on the same floor level as the priest, he scoffs, humouring himself without a word—the priest is lucky to have such a pretty face and voice to lure people into the cult, for height and size are sorely lacking. “See, I was sent to retrieve you, actually.”
Sunday blinks. His eyes are sufficiently cute to make up for the rest, but should he look straight ahead, he would meet Gallagher’s unbuttoned shirt and chest hair—and that soon happens, but the honey-sweet eyes narrow, and he presses his lips together. The corner of his eye trembles. “...So you’re his new hire.”
Gallagher smiles in comfort. “Help me a little, will you, birdie?”
“Don’t call me that.” Sunday looks up again, mouth perfect to snarl at him. “You’re the new bloodhound, and no more than that.”
“Call me by my name, and I’ll consider it.”
Sunday is clearly unhappy, now crossing his arms on his chest. “You have not given me your name at all.”
“Ah, you only needed to ask, dove,” and he ignores how Sunday murmurs, quit it with that one, too, and blushes at the mention. “Name’s Gallagher. Now, he asked me to take you back before the Devil’s hour.”
“Will you tell me what is happening?” Despite its (rightfully put) suspicions, Sunday is a diligent spirit and follows Gallagher with careful observation. “I only know I was to have a new bodyguard after the accident.”
Everyone knows of the disastrous attempt on his sister, Miss Robin of the Oak Family—the second heir of the pastor. The Charmony Festival is annually hosted by the Family at the cathedral. Still, a few weeks before Gallagher and Sunday’s first encounter, the ceremony became a bloodbath in a matter of seconds. While Gallagher had not known of the heirs nor been present at the event, words spread fast, and so came the request—the payment—for his presence. What is a Bloodhound to do if it does not eliminate the threats?
The payment was good, but Sunday was better.
“After you, angel.” Gallagher stops before the door and allows Sunday to go first, adding his enchanting beam for the sake of kindness.
Sunday looks him up and down once more. “Fix your tie and button up your shirt. You look poor.” And with that, he walks away.
Gallagher does not comment on how Sunday did not argue against the new nickname.
Sunday takes the bed, and even if the mattress is big and comfortable enough for more than two bodies, Gallagher knows better than to try and lie down when he is wishing to put his beloved’s head in a spike. He knows that bringing Mikhail up turns Gallagher into the worst part of himself, a part that he welcomes, but never in Sunday’s presence.
There are limitations to what he can show. Even if he is not embarrassed or scared to come back home with his hands stained with blood, paint his reluctant lover with gore, or kill with an audience, Mikhail is not something they talk about. Like Robin, it is a forbidden topic they can never discuss.
As soon as he’s done with his bath, Gallagher sits on the divan and curses Sunday for breaking all the objects available in the goddamn place. The living room is a mess, but there are chances he could do worse now that he was pushed to his limits and beyond. He doesn’t have a cigarette. The hotel’s beer is less than ideal, with all that fancy bullshit and wines that could never make him more than simply dizzy.
Better than nothing.
The first sip is disgustingly sweet.
Gallagher knows this is the kind of wine Sunday loves, but never enjoys, for he feels guilty as a murderer for it. A display of sin, the excesses and exposition, he says, only to drink with the most docile and cute pout ever.
…it takes more willpower than he wants to admit, but Gallagher picks up two elegant cups and fills them with the wine. Dark red, deliciously tempting, dangerously addictive.
When he gets to the bedroom, he finds Sunday kneeling at the edge of the bed, supporting his weight on the mattress and hands so tight they become paler and paler with strength. Red around the nails, even from afar. He must have fidgeted with them in the bath. It almost reminds Gallagher of the first time he met him, dutifully kneeling before the altar, but he much prefers this view—Sunday looks astounding in the clothes of the Lord, but he looks like a saint in the finest white nightgown.
Sunday quits his hushed prayers, opening his eyes to meet Gallagher with two glasses of wine at the door. He bites his lips but moves not even an inch to welcome his bodyguard. Instead, he stares in a quiet defiance—he fucked up, he brought up Mikhail, and yet it is Gallagher who crawls back. A silent victory.
“I told you I wouldn’t be spreading my legs for you tonight,” murmurs Sunday, knuckles brushing against his lips as he curls the hands of prayer. “You know, getting me drunk or drugging me won’t do anything to make me more pliant.”
“I’m not trying to fuck you,” scoffs Gallagher, approaching in slow steps. He doesn’t want to admit that, yes, he wants to calm Sunday down so they can at least sleep together, for when they sleep in separate rooms and with bad blood spilt between them, others pay for their resentment—Sunday feels guilty for it. Gallagher has a job to do. “You hurt yourself again.”
It is a sight to have the priest kneeling and looking up at him with those doe-eyes of his. “I thought you would’ve enjoyed knowing I’m punishing myself for my foolishness.”
“Really, now.” Gallagher doesn’t believe it.
“I should have known better than to choose you to keep me safe. I am paying the price for a harshly thought decision made under a cloudy judgement.” Sunday might even sound and seem regretful, the perfect martyr that Gopher Wood wants him to be, but Gallagher is more clever than to believe it. His rage does not lower, though, and Sunday continues, knowing the reaction he will cause, “I ought to pray harder to cleanse of the sins you made me commit.”
“Talking like that, one might think I take you by force. Don’t twist the facts in your favour, angel.” If Gallagher tightens his fingers a bit more, he might break the glass and spill red on the sheets. It wouldn’t be apparent, not with the beautiful charcoal hues, but he would rather avoid the stench.
“You say you didn’t plan on taking me to bed, then?” Sunday abandons the prayer pose and tugs in the sheets, almost motioning to lift himself from the floor. “No, no, how silly of me. It never needed to be on a bed—you took me in that dirty alley like the rabid dog you are.” He looks up at Gallagher with arrogance; he who knows, is bordering on making them rip each other’s throats. “Slamming me against that wet, besmirched wall and not giving a fuck if my hands were being scratched, if I begged you to stop, cutting me open with your—”
Gallagher breaks the glass, the cups fall to the floor, and Sunday gasps for the third time in the night when Gallagher picks him up, holding him by the shoulders and throwing him on the bed.
“The only thing you begged me for was faster and harder, dove.” Sunday squirms under him, damaged throat rasping in his moans. “You talk on and on about how filthy and unmannered I am, but you are not better—you think your God can help you? You think I lured you into devilry when you pleaded, so I filled you up?”
Sunday laughs, weak and with no bite; he is not even fighting. “The Devil works just as well as God. You would know.”
“If there’s one Devil in this story, it’s you.” Now, it’s Gallagher’s turn to laugh. “I bet you’re dying of need, wanting something between your legs to fuck you good. How long has it been since the last time we did it?” When Sunday swallows under him, Gallagher considers it a victory; his victory. “A week is a bit too long for a greedy thing like you, isn’t it.”
To part Sunday’s legs is easy, but the boy hates it. “Why don’t you find a whore to fuck? I bet you find their mouths better than mine and their cunts more eager.”
“Do you think depriving yourself of this will serve as punishment?” Gallagher caresses his cheek, and for a change, Sunday even stops smiling and frowning but does not argue. “Capricious little thing. Everything has to be done abiding to your wants, even if it’s something you loathe but think it suits you,” he snickers. “I never fell for that. You can lie to everyone but not me, angel.”
“Who says I’m lying? I was never meant to wed, to be dirtied by the whims of the flesh. You took it from me.”
Sunday speaks as if he has no idea how good he looks on top of the black sheets. The skin, the hair, the eyes, all meant to be worshipped. Gallagher has to remind himself that, indeed, Sunday has no idea of it. Too humble, too taken by guilt to realise the kind of relic he is.
“No, you weren’t made for any of that,” says Gallagher, and his hands trail up to hold Sunday’s wrists against the sheets above his head. “They locked you in a cage so you wouldn’t fly away, and now you believe your place is inside iron bars you can’t escape from. Wanna know what you were made for, sweet boy?” He envelops Sunday’s wrists in one tight enclosure, descending his fingers to the pretty pair of lips he, unfortunately, dreams and kisses too often to be healthy. “Frivolous and spoiled, that’s what you should be. Overindulged until you no longer remember the seven capital sins and just let yourself be spoiled rotten.”
Sunday closes his eyes and shakes his head. “We all serve the Lord. Displays of opulence and… and greed are sins. I ought to be humble.”
“You ought to be inlaid with diamonds like the saints you people pray to.” Gallagher will remember, in the following morning, to make an appointment at the jeweller, envisioning the image of Sunday with all types of crystals on his body—sapphires for thigh-chains, lapis-lazulis for chokers, a gorgeous corset with pearls.
With these thoughts, Gallagher turns Sunday on his belly, draping his frame over the other, and his angel sings so beautifully under him.
“You despicable dog.” Sunday’s hiss is just low, with no bite or venom. “We cannot do this. No, no, not anymore, I need to redeem myself, I need to…”
But Gallagher scoffs, brushing pale hair from his vision so he can kiss the tempting nape at his mercy. “Redeem yourself for feeling good? That’s some guilt, sweetheart.” After so long, he knows the path to Sunday’s groin by heart, fingers lifting the nightgown until the hip bone is exposed, and he lets them linger on the soft skin.
“I told you to leave me be, you degenerate mongrel.” It appears, however, that Sunday’s docile demeanour has limits, for he curses under his breath and, even with his eyes glistening with unshed tears, he glares at Gallagher with the will of a thousand fires. “You can find someone else to warm your prick, again.”
“My job is to ensure you are never in need—how can I deny you pleasure when you’re harming yourself for it?”
Gallagher might enjoy this more than he should, but it is better than giving into the wrath and turning the affair into something neither he nor Sunday will revel in. He lifts Sunday’s hips just enough for his fingers to move as they wish and thinks of the following argument they will have on the morrow or the following week. He hopes they can have another honeymoon season before knives and curses are thrown again.
…until Sunday opens his mouth, that is. “Is this how you treated Mikhail?”
Any clever remark he was going to say is lost with the painful sound of his gasp, complaints stopped in the middle of his throat when Gallagher manhandles him without grace or care over the bed, forcing his face down and pulling his hips up.
“You’ve been getting on my nerves quite a lot for the past few days.” If Gallagher claimed that Sunday’s naughtiness does not arouse him, he would be a worse liar than he already is. Maybe that is why they fight so much, and never will get along without inflicting wounds on each other. “Lucky for you, I know how to burn you just right, too.”
Sunday’s thighs are soaked, deliciously wet, and Gallagher has half a mind than to get on his knees and bury his face between them when his cock aches and aches and keeps aching with the need for release. No matter how many harlots he mounts or throats he spills in, Sunday will make him feel like he found no satisfaction at all. Worse than nicotine, worse than alcohol, Gallagher wants to crack his ribs and consume him whole.
Just brushing the tip of his cock against the warm cunt makes Sunday tremble, gasps interrupted by hard swallows and dying complaints. “N-No… no, I can’t do this…”
“Yes, you can. Just let go, angel.” Gallagher leans down and bites Sunday’s earlobe in sweetness and gentleness, but his hands grip Sunday’s thin waist with severity. His palm fits perfectly; his fingers meet each other just above the belly button. A flawless fit, the only acceptable one instead of priest clothing hiding every inch of skin.
The first thrust is never easy. Even wet and pliant, Sunday is tight, and both moan when Gallagher’s cock pushes deeper and deeper—Sunday tugs at the sheets and shuts his eyes, voiceless and open-mouthed, begging for comfort. He finally lets his voice sing when Gallagher sheaths himself completely, moving the little he can as if he could push just a little more.
As of right now, Gallagher remembers why he so readily agreed to keep this jailed bird safe. He heaves breath and remembers why it was effortless to accept the contract without even looking at the several zeros involved, the thousands and thousands of credits that would make him rich until the end of his days. He remembers that he never intended to return the jailed bird to its prior owner. They were meant to be each other’s the moment Gallagher stepped foot into that church, and is hardly an absent God that will forbid him.
When he feels Sunday has eased around his cock, he pulls and thrusts once more. And again. And again, and until he fucks his darling hard enough to make him forget where his loyalty lies.
“Soul of Christ… sanctify me… ah, ah—body of Christ, save me…” Sunday still moans wantonly, as if he was born to pray with pleasure instead of sorrow, and he catches the crystal rosary, holding onto it more fiercely each time Gallagher increases his thrusts. “Blood of Christ, inebriate m… ah…”
Gallagher snickers, bringing Sunday closer; chest to back, arms trapping arms. “Your God abandoned you, angel. I am your God now.” Sunday bites his lip and tightens around him, but Gallagher has none of that—he wants to hear the little bird sing. The hound’s hold around his jaw is as firm and ruthless as the rest of him. “Pretty thing like you was never meant to be kneeling unless it's for cock, with a real man to take care of you.”
Sunday scoffs, and one tear runs down his cheek. “You mean— ah, you?”
“Born to be capricious and spoiled, forced to be humble and penitent. No, that shouldn’t be you.”
He pushes Sunday on his hands and knees and doesn’t stop until the only sounds coming out of that velvet mouth are whines, incomprehensible whimpers and rasping pleas from his damaged throat, rosary abandoned to be hanging with no purpose around his neck.
“Sweet and pliant, though? Always filled to the brim, fucked until you can’t remember your own name? That’s more fitting.” Gallagher knows Sunday is close, with his voice shattering continuously, more like cries than deep grunts, his legs no longer standing, his arms giving in, and his name almost uttered in a mercy request. Almost. “A perfect wife.”
Sunday reaches his high, but Gallagher does not know if it is out of arousal or surprise at being pounded so harshly. Soon, Gallagher follows him, fucking him through yet another orgasm and whispering the same sweet nothings and promises they will eventually break.
“I-I wasn’t…” Sunday breathes with difficulty, half of his face buried in the sheets. “You speak of blasphemy…”
Gallagher does not feel inclined to remove himself yet. “The only blasphemy is your cunt not being constantly full of cock, cum or diamonds, angel.”
“You—!” Sunday squirms under him, but with no success. “How dare you—”
…any complaint dies out when their lips meet, and for a change, it isn’t heated, full of anger or vengeful.
Gallagher lets his body fall, slowly, until his body covers Sunday’s graceful and exhausted frame, intertwining their fingers above the sheets. “I can make you happy if you let me,” he says, kissing the priest’s shoulder. “We can be better.”
But Sunday can be utterly loathsome when he wants. “You know we can never be better than nothing.”
…the honeymoon phase was good while it lasted. Gallagher has to plan for the next one.