Loving the Wolf

By K.M. Washatka

Aoshi moaned his disapproval as Saitou pushed on top of him. Saitou's rough yet somehow elegant hands were prying at his pants. How had this even happened? One moment they were enjoying tea and conversation and the next Saitou was stripping him down and devouring him like a beast. And, oh, it felt so good… but it was wrong. He didn't love this man, and he knew Saitou was just being a horny bastard getting some from the first person available.

"Saitou…" He moaned. "Stop."

"What?" Saitou whispered in his ear, his hot breath tickling Aoshi's earlobe. "Before we even get started?"

"G-get off…me."

Saitou lifted his body onto his hands and knees, pulling off of Aoshi, and flipped the marvelous younger boy over to look at him.

"Was that a command, boy?" He said, pressing down on him, his naked torso pushing Aoshi so hard against the floor he couldn't breathe.

Aoshi struggled to push Saitou off. "Yes, it was."

Saitou kissed Aoshi deep on the mouth, his tongue sliding practically down Aoshi's throat, and his lips and teeth gnawing Aoshi's lips. When he pulled back one tiny string of saliva still connected their mouths for a moment.

"You do NOT command a wolf, Aoshi." Saitou nipped his ear. "You beg."

Aoshi sneered. "Beg?"

"Yes," Saitou's thin golden eyes stared coldly into Aoshi's gorgeous, depthless green ones. "Like a dog."

Aoshi tensed as Saitou smirked that damned cocky grin at him, and with a surprising power brought up by the frustrated rage Saitou's demeaning comment had put into him thrust the larger man off him.

Saitou lay stunned on the floor for a moment as Aoshi rose to his feet, re-fastening his pants around his waist in doing so.

"And you do NOT," Aoshi hissed. "Assume to control one of the oniwabanshu."

Saitou sat up slowly, his eyes staying trained carefully on Aoshi and he took him in deeply with those wolf-like eyes of his. Even in Aoshi's anger at him Aoshi felt himself entranced by Saitou, and that incredible, powerful grace that made him impossibly beautiful. Aoshi retreated backwards several steps, until his back nearly touched the far wall.

"I see." Saitou said at length. "I didn't think you would take it that way."

Saitou rose to his feet and closed his pants, all the while his eyes still on Aoshi with such deep intensity it made Aoshi quiver slightly.

"I'm sorry." Saitou said as he slipped his shirt and jacket back on. "I'll keep my place in the future."

Something in his tone of voice made Aoshi uneasy. "Are you mocking me?"

"No." Saitou said simply and with a tip of his hat after placing it carefully back over that silky raven hair he finally broke his gaze and walked out of the room.

Aoshi stood in shock watching the doorway long after Saitou had slid it shut behind him, wondering why he couldn't get the idea of feeling of that man inside him out of his mind.

A couple days later Aoshi relaxed on the back porch of Aoi-ya watching Misao tending to the many lovely flower and evergreen gardens. Still, even now, he couldn't stop thinking about the incident, and especially the way those eyes, those wonderfully enchanting eyes, had watched him so intently.

The door behind Aoshi slid open and Okina stepped outside briefly.

"There's a guest for you." He said.

Aoshi nodded and went inside, wondering who could be calling on him. He knew so few people, and most of them lived in Tokyo. Surely not…?

He entered the living room and stopped dead in his tracks. Saitou sat comfortably in that armchair by the window, smirking at him around a cigarette.

"Hello there, Aoshi." He said.

"What do you want?" Aoshi said sternly.

Saitou raised his eyebrows. "No time for pleasantries?"

"If you have no business here, I request you leave immediately."

"So damn formal, Aoshi."

"Do you or do you not have a reason for coming here?"

"I have a reason." Saitou said, sounding a little peeved. "I'm getting to it."

"Hurry up, I have better things to do than listen to you."

Saitou gave Aoshi a long look and Aoshi felt with no small amount of displeasure, a slight longing forming in his stomach.

Saitou tapped the ashes off the end of his cigarette into the ashtray, and placed it in the holder before standing up and approaching Aoshi. The more slender boy pulled back immediately, retreating equal steps as Saitou advanced.

"Don't be skittish." Saitou smirked still coming forward. "I just want to speak softly, without the rest of the house hearing."

"Anything you have to say to me that you wish to keep private I have no desire to hear." Aoshi said, his voice a rushed tremble.

"You sound so odd." Saitou said and his eyes flitted up and down Aoshi.

"Say whatever you came to say and leave."

Saitou smiled. Smirked. He smirked. That jackass never really smiled. "You seem so nervous, I'm afraid I'll give you a heart attack."

The two of them kept walking around the room, Aoshi keeping a safe distance from Saitou, matching him move for move. "There's little that can surprise me coming from your mouth, Saitou."

"All right then. I came to ask you something."

"What?"

Aoshi backed into a table unexpectedly, and Saitou pounced forward in that moment's pause. He came within an inch of him, his hands gripping the same table Aoshi leaned against so that Saitou was leaning over the green-eyed boy slightly.

"I'm asking you," Saitou said, and their mouths were so close his lips brushed Aoshi's as he spoke. "To be my lover."

Aoshi was silent for one moment of complete and total calm between them before Aoshi punched Saitou right on his face, knocking him away a few feet and allowing Aoshi to stand straight again.

"How dare you!" Aoshi raged.

Saitou looked up at him, holding his bleeding jaw, and said nothing.

"You senseless idiot!" Aoshi continued. "After what you tried to do to me you think you can barge into my house and ask for me to service you?" Saitou gave no reply, even if Aoshi had waited for one. "How can you be such a jackass? How can you—?"

Aoshi broke off in a quick breath as he saw the look Saitou was giving him. Those cold, angry eyes were staring at him endlessly, poisonously. He seemed angry and…offended? Hurt?

"Get out." Aoshi said, but his voice had lost all its force, and the words came out in a shivering rush of air.

Saitou made no move to leave. He instead squared his shoulders and came at Aoshi again, and this time Aoshi couldn't move, he was pinned under that gaze. When Saitou came up to Aoshi he grabbed his shoulders and turning him harshly pinned him against the wall. Aoshi gasped and tried to struggle but all of the strength had left his muscles.

"Saitou…" He whispered, stuck under that intense look.

"Aoshi." Saitou replied and leaned forward to kiss him hard on the mouth.

"No…" Aoshi whimpered helplessly as Saitou pulled back.

"Listen to me. I don't want you once, and I don't want for the summer." Saitou's voice was angry, but at the same time…desperate? The man was so hard to read! "I want you with me forever, Aoshi. Until the day I die, I want you beside me."

Aoshi froze entirely then. His whole body and mind went completely still for a moment and then slowly feeling crept back into his body.

"You…" he breathed. "You…YOU IDIOT!"

Saitou winced. "Aoshi…"

"You don't even have the right to speak my name! How dare you be as presumptuous as to think I would want you? Do you always just assume someone would love to be your whore? That someone would do anything for a chance to sleep with you, oh great Wolf of Mibu?"

"Aoshi. That's not what I…"

"I don't want to listen to you!" Aoshi cried flinging Saitou away as his strength returned and Saitou didn't struggle. "I hate you! You're a cocky, arrogant, egotistic, over-sexed, pervert!"

Finally Aoshi calmed and Saitou and he stood a couple feet away from each other, Aoshi's chest heaving and Saitou staring at the ground.

"Why are you still here?" Aoshi hissed. "Get out of my house."

"I'm so sorry Aoshi." Saitou said, his eyes still looking only at the floor. "If I had known how much you detest me I would have kept my place."

Saitou finally looked up at Aoshi as he walked past him to the hallway, and Aoshi's heart skipped a beat at the intense look of remorse in those intense eyes.

Aoshi stood quite still for a long time after Saitou left, finally dropping to his knees when he heard the door slam behind Saitou.

That night Aoshi lay on his futon, staring at the ceiling as a storm raged outside. He could hear the rain thundering down on the roof of Aoi-ya and cascading onto the streets and gardens below.

He must be listening to this rain too. Aoshi thought. Is he thinking of me…?

With a sigh Aoshi sat up, the thick blanket sliding down to reveal his powerful body, his robe halfway through falling off him. He straightened the robe, and stood up. His sparsely decorated room echoed the sounds of the storm hollowly, making Aoshi feel for some reason very lonely. He wandered to the door to the back porch, and watched the silhouettes of rain drops trickling down the screen. Slowly he opened the door and walked onto the roofed second-level deck, staring at the misty garden below dazedly.

Why, you fool? Why can't you stop thinking about him…?

Aoshi crossed his arms, hugging himself, and he thought about those glorious golden eyes, that incredibly powerful body…that sweet mouth tasting lightly of those customary cigarettes. Aoshi shook his head and leaned against the railing, the light spray of water that worked its way under the roof moistening him lightly. His stomach was in knots, his head was pounding, and his heart cried out…Aoshi closed his eyes and a soft moan passed his lips.

Aoshi, you are a damned idiot.

With that final thought of weak resistance he spun around and raced through his house, downstairs and out the front door, not even bothering to grab his trade-mark large white coat as he did. He couldn't fight anymore, and he realized that now. There was simply no way he could live with himself if he spent the rest of his life fighting what his own heart was screaming at him. The rain drenched his yukata and hair in moments and plastered them to his lean body and lovely face as he rushed through the Kyoto streets. It wasn't far to Saitou's house, and soon he saw it looming through the haze and his heart leapt into his throat, wondering if he could even go through with this. But he had no choice now. He couldn't stop now. He practically slammed into the door and pounded it with his open palm, calling Saitou's name as drops of freezing water ran down his face. The door flew open and Saitou stood staring at the younger man in shock, his thin golden eyes scanning every inch of the soaking man as if not able to believe he was there.

"What are you doing here?" Saitou said his face still a perfect picture of surprise.

"I have to tell you something." Aoshi replied.

Saitou nodded slowly. "Come inside first…"

Aoshi shook his head as he panted for breath, still worn from his freezing run. "No, I have to tell you right now or I never will." He looked up and the two of them met eyes, aqua searching gold, and Aoshi said. "I love you."

If possible Saitou's expression became even more shocked, and then a smile spread onto his face, a real smile of genuine relief and joy as Aoshi had never seen from him. Slowly Saitou stepped out onto the landing, his hands reaching toward Aoshi sensitively, subtly wrapping around him until Saitou was holding Aoshi close to his chest.

"You beautiful boy, I love you too." Saitou whispered.

Aoshi laughed slightly, for no more reason than the beautiful release of stress. "Saitou…" he cooed.

They came apart only a small bit, enough so Aoshi could look up at Saitou as the wolf of Mibu also became soaked with rain and then Saitou leaned forward and Aoshi tilted his head back to meet him in a soft, love-filled kiss that they held for as long as they possibly could. When they finally pulled apart Aoshi stared up at Saitou with his eyes filled with such deep, intense love Saitou almost completely lost control of himself and broke into tears. Instead he laughed, deeply and powerfully and lifted Aoshi into his arms. Aoshi laughed softly, watching Saitou closely every second, and Saitou swooped down for another kiss, and then he carried Aoshi inside, where he would simply have to get that soaking yukata off him to dry, and where they would spend a long night together, never once leaving each other's arms.

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