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Afterwards, his dreams are frayed with broken images of lovers from a previous life, smoke and blood, battlefield abroad and at home, bullets and cries never relenting, it grips, grips onto his heart until he wakes with a start and doesn't know how to settle back down.
John Reese is not one easily disturbed by nightmares, but when he has one, it unroots him, sends him into a dizzy frenzy, for he wakes up and finds himself alone in a spacious loft that looks barely lived in, and he isn't sure that he did wake up.
This time, he dreams of Finch. Just a glimpse of Root's face, and a single shot is all it takes - in the dream he watches helplessly even as he fires back on autopilot, while Finch widens his eyes a little, as if surprised, then crumbles to the floor. No taunts, no last minute confessions, no words, the anti-climax of it all had an air of finality so real that it locked onto his throat, and made him choke.
He wakes up with a jolt.
The nightlight is on, giving an eerie glow to the spacious loft. For a moment Reese lies there, heart pounding, head swimming, as the realisation of his everyday perils hits him again, the fact that he, despite his best efforts, cared again, and it will inevitably bring him pain. Like the time he proclaimed his happiness and got caught merely hours after, and the time he thought it could not have been any worse and then a truck slammed into his car. Story of John Reese's life.
He stays awake for what feels like hours, wishing for the dawn of the morning light, but it doesn't come. Every muscle and every bone is his body is agitated, the ghost of an image behind his closed eyes, the bed feels ungrounded, the loft too empty to be safe. He sits up, and runs a hand through his hair. Adrenaline fails to settle down in his veins, clear heartbeat pulsating in his ears, his hands tingle and even the sense of touch is dulled, nothing feels real anymore, the dim light is too quiet, too engulfing, too still.
Reese makes his way to the bathroom and flick on the switch. His pupils constrict in the sudden influx of light, but the man in the mirror barely flinches. He turns on the tap, though he doesn't do anything about it. Lowering his head and trying to breathe deeply, Reese's gaze drop to the toiletries. A sharp razor stuck out of the bag, the only thing he has used here aside from the toothbrush.
He hesitates.
Fingers ghosting over the sharp edge of the blade, Reese toys it absent-mindedly, thinking about the phantom pain in his chest, and how physical pain would overcome that, if only a little. He lifts it, sees his own reflection in the tiny blade, and closes his eyes.
"Stop, John," Finch's voice suddenly appears in his ear, startling him. Reese stills. He barely removes his earpieces nowadays in case of an emergency, but communication is often cut when they are not working together. He isn't aware he had left the line open before he went to bed.
"Let it go," Finch says softly, almost as a whisper. "There are other ways to feel."
Reese hesitates.
"Let it go, John."
Not an order, an admonishing, or a plea, but delivered in the calm, level voice that he has grown accustomed to, that which grounds him in the testiest of situations.
Reese releases the blade, and notices that his fingers have gone white because of the tension. His mouth is dry, and he says nothing.
"I can help," Finch tells him in his ear. A mere proclamation, not a question or a demand, but a calm, confident and mildly authoritative tone that somehow just works. Reese looks up and searches the bathroom instinctively for a camera.
"There are no cameras in here," Finch says. "There is one next to your bedside table, which is how I can see you now, but only your back, since you left your bathroom door open. Come back to the living room now, John."
Reese complies. They never discussed it before, but Reese calms visibly when he is given an order, without too much painful thinking and considering on his part. When the ex-agent is too wound up to care, this is the only way to relax him, and he has no doubt that Finch knows this, along with a million other tiny details that never makes into a conversation, but instead is kept together with mutual trust.
Reese stands in the middle of the room, barefooted, waiting. The breathing sound he hears from Finch is even, and it grounds him further. He glances around.
"There is a camera on the opposite wall to the bed," Finch says quietly. "Move towards the bed, if you will. I can see you from there."
Reese does what he is told, and stands next to the bed, his face towards the direction of the camera. A cursory glance is all he needs to figure out where the camera actually is, and his eyes lock onto it. There is a red light blinking underneath it, which he's sure is deliberate, for his benefit.
"If at any point you want to stop, John," Finch says, in a low voice. "I only want to help."
Reese has a good idea of what is going to happen now, and certain parts of his body tenses in anticipation. He looks into the camera beseechingly, and lets a tiny, almost invisible smile ghost over his lips as he gives a curt nod.
"Good," Finch replies, equally soft. "Now, take off your shirt, if you will."
Reese does as he is told, slow and methodically, though not quite in a seducing manner, all the while never removing eyes from the camera.
"You are too tense," Finch tells him. "Roll out your shoulders back. Take a deep breath."
Reese starts to inhale, but is cut short.
"Close your eyes," Finch says, quieter than before. "It's all right. I've got you."
Reese closes his eyes slowly, fighting back an irrational swell of emotions in his chest, threatening to burst free. He inhales, and exhales. Inhales, exhales.
"Good," Finch says. There is a small pause. "You've probably been told this before, but if not recently by anyone else, then I'd like to remind you - you are beautiful, John."
Reese snap his eyes open abruptly, momentarily stunned. The breathing in his ear doesn't even hitch.
"You are," Finch says with an air of confidence and finality. "Your body is graceful and lethal at the same time. As is your person." Another pause. "You should realise the strength and beauty you hold, and the appreciation from the people around you, even away from the battlefield."
Reese stares into the camera and says nothing. His eyes, however, speaks a million things and none of it goes unnoticed.
Another pause, longer now, though the consistent breathing pattern reassures him, and roots him to the ground.
Finally Finch speaks again. "Take off your underwear for me, John," softly, with a hint of request, but strong enough to be taken as an order.
Reese's heart leaps to his throat, among other body parts that also leaps, and he pulls down his briefs in one determined, slow, and fluid motion.
The breathing in his ear finally hitches, just a little bit. He smiles, just a little bit, too.
"Lie down on the bed," Finch tells him, the voice betraying nothing. "Find a comfortable position."
He does.
"Touch yourself for me," Finch tells him, sliding over easily the non-existent pause between 'yourself' and 'for me'. "Make yourself feel, for me."
Reese looks up to the ceiling, aware that if he strained to look at the camera his neck would be sore at the end of it. He places a hand on his chest, and tentatively trails down, -
"Stop," Finch says, just before he closes his hand over the part that matters. "I said touch, not move. Just trail your fingers over your cock for now, John."
The addressed body part jumps at the command, and Reese vaguely notes that it is the first time he has heard Finch use a word as obscene and blunt as this. He does as he's told almost automatically, ignoring the maddening palpitation in his chest.
"Good," Finch breathes in his ear, intimate, and he almost hallucinates the warmth that radiates from it. "Lightly for now. And the underside, that's where you'd be most sensitive."
Reese complies, his eyes shuttering and breath hitching in the knowledge that Finch has an excellent view of his body on display. He touches his now fully erect cock slowly and leisurely as requested, only with his finger, and feels the tension seeping out of his body as he unconsciously keeps his pace akin to the breathing in his ear.
"This is how I would do it, John," Finch murmurs, and Reese opens his eyes again. "I would admire you, appreciate you, slowly and deliberately, as if there is all the time in the world."
Reese sucks in a short, staccato of a breath and his hands tremor a little bit, as if on edge. He sits up in a little bit, against the headboard, so that he can see the camera once again, and stares back into the red light that blinks incessantly.
"It's just me, John," Finch tells him, as if noticing his attention. "Let everything else go, just for now. I've got you."
Reese lowers his eyes again, his dark lashes casting a shadow under his eyes. He still says nothing.
"Now stroke yourself. Slowly, focus on the movement of your fingers, the touch of your palm. There is no hurry." Finch says in an almost spellbinding voice, "There is no one to please other than yourself."
Reese does; though he steals an occasional glance at the camera through hooded eyes.
"Take it slow. Place your other hand on your balls, squeeze a little. Very good, John."
He is achingly hard now; the voice in his ear is slow and soft, full of dark promise, yet a sensual torture. Reese forces himself to slow down, though his breathing inevitably heightens, and he stares at the camera pleadingly.
"Spread yourself more for me, John."
He seems to float on Finch's voice, though it is also the voice holds him down, and he follows the instructions without hesitation.
"You are wet," Finch says, and it's almost a purr. Reese feels a shiver of heat up his spine, and his breath catches for a moment. "Spread it over your head, slowly."
He does, and it is maddening.
"Run your finger over your slit," Finch tells him, quiet and revering. "Gently. This is how I would run my tongue over it, John. To taste you, before taking you in."
Reese inhales sharply, almost like a sob, the irrationality in his chest threatening to overtake him and burst. "Please," he rasps, the first sound he makes the whole night.
"I've got you," Finch repeats, the calm and arousing voice enticing him to oblivion. "A long stroke now, John, all the way to the bottom. That's how I would take you whole."
Reese shuts his eyes close, almost panting now, his chest and cock both aching too much. "Please," he says again, though his ability to follow it with a coherent request is out of the window.
"Stroke yourself for me, John," Finch says, voice low with hidden desire. "I'm here. Stroke yourself long and languid all the way, then short and fast around the head. This is how I will wrap my mouth around you, drag my tongue over you, take you in and slide over your head, so that you forget everything but this. Please yourself for me, John."
He does; he forgets everything and lets the sound of Finch's voice be the only thing that attach him to this reality, nothing else matters, only the voice in his ear, and the intense pleasure shooting down his spine. "Harold," he chokes out the other man's name, as if he's drowning.
"I'm here, John," the only connection to the world he has left answers duly, promptly, in the voice that never fails him. "Harder now. Faster. I would want to feel all of you, completely and without reserve. Let it go, John. I've got you."
Breathing and composure broken by his naked desire, Reese casts one last glance at the camera, full of trust and meaning and promise and unspoken truth; and spirals into a frenzy that leads to white, hot oblivion.
Reese returns from the tiny corner of his mind that is free from all the bad things in the world, seemingly in hours and minutes. There is a sticky mess on his stomach, and as he shifts to wipe it away, he feels sated in a way he hasn't felt in a long time. The dull ache in his chest has unravelled into something else, not quite pain, but a sense of relief and pleasure so intense that it almost hurts, too.
"Harold," He tries, though the voice comes out hoarse. "Are you still there?"
"Always, John."
He thinks he can hear a tiny smile on the other end of the line, and he exhales. The aftershocks make his body more limp and relaxed than it has been in a long while, and suddenly he is without words again.
"Would you like to sleep now?" Finch asks, quietly.
Reese considers it. His eyes flicker to the camera; the red light have stopped blinking, though he is sure that Finch is continuing to watch him, at least for a while more. "What are you going to do, Finch?"
The sound of something ruffling in his ear. "I have some business of my own to tend to," Finch says, in surprising level honesty.
Reese smiles. "Do you want me to come over and take care of it?"
A pause, then a small chuckle. "No one's keeping score, John," Finch tells him softly. "Next time."
Reese feels he ought to be disappointed, though his heart leapt unceremoniously at the promise of next time. He gazes at the camera again, beseechingly, all the while asking questions and giving answers that he knows only the other man will understand.
"Yes," Finch says, in the same reassuring and calm tone that grounds him day and night. "Sleep now, John. I have you."
Reese closes his eyes as he's told, smiling a little. The sound of Finch's even breathing is still in his ear, and for the first time in a long while, he is certain the nightmare will not make a return.
FIN