The Lengths That I Would Go To

[abrightboy]

The killer was moving around the country. Malcolm Bright could see the pattern, but he wasn't working for the FBI these days and they weren't exactly taking his calls. Short sighted of them, but they did fire him on suspicion of being crazy. The NYPD's jurisdiction was New York. With the killer beyond its borders, they handed it upwards and left it at that.

Let it go, Bright, had been Gil's sage advice. You can't catch every killer in America single-handedly.

Challenge accepted, some part of him retorted, though he'd only nodded mutely and forced a smile. Gil knew he hadn't simply let it go, but he wasn't going to have him followed to stop him doing anything stupid, either. He didn't have the will or the resources to keep tabs on Malcolm Bright 24/7 and Malcolm Bright knew it.

His mother, on the other hand, had extensive resources, so he simply didn't tell her he was leaving town. He did arrange for Ainsley to feed his bird, so the truth would come out eventually, but he'd be several states away by then.

He rode the bus. There was something oddly comforting about the anonymity of being in a crowd of strangers who had no interest in him whatsoever. He stared out the window and watched the country go by. When he stepped off the Greyhound in Lexington, Kentucky, he walked to a nearby hotel and checked in, then headed straight to the US Marshals office. There was no point in trying to talk to the FBI. If he was going to stop a killer from killing again, he needed someone in law enforcement to listen to him. The pattern suggested the next murder would happen in one of the rural communities around Lexington and it would be precipitated by a young woman's disappearance. He needed law enforcement with local knowledge, specifically.

He wandered into the Marshals' offices in a tidy three piece suit, charcoal grey with a burgundy tie perfectly knotted at his collar. He got a few suspicious sidelong glances but nobody asked if they could help him. He cleared his throat.

"Um, hello? I'm wondering if there's anyone here I can talk to about murder." He held up his hands. "Stopping murder, specifically, not... like... smalltalk."

Comments

[abrightboy]

"Not 'plenty'," Malcolm said. "Two. ...Maybe three of them. Nobody else got close enough to find out what a unique fixer-upper opportunity I am."

He stepped into the street and put a hand up. A taxi pulled over and Malcolm opened the door for Raylan before sliding in next to him.

[tinstar]

"Makes you sound like Arlo's house.. Except you've got curb appeal." Raylan slid into the taxi and let Malcolm rattle off his address.

"Your mother shouldn't chide you in front of strangers," he said, admitting to another piece of irritation as his right hand thumb pushed his finger around some more. "I don't think she acknowledges who or what you and I stop out there.."

It was good work and her mental security was, in part, due to their efforts and many other people like them.

[abrightboy]

"There are a lot of things my mother shouldn't do," he admitted. "And if I could only stop one of them, it'd be the 10am tumbler of gin. I'm used to the chiding and it won't take years off her life."

He glanced out the window and then looked at Raylan. "She doesn't dislike cops. She appreciates what they do. She just..." He took a deep breath and gave a sort of helpless shake of his head. "She thinks it's beneath me as a job."

[tinstar]

"But you're good at it," Raylan replied, eyes lighting up with a little fire in them. "And that lookin' down her nose at people. I understand that her money and lifestyle entitle her to her opinion, but its opinions like that that keep us country folk away from places like this."

His fingers rubbed together some more as he looked at Malcolm. "What do you say to her opinion of your profession?"

[abrightboy]

"I don't usually dignify it with more than an eye-roll. She doesn't actively try to stop me. But if you want to get down to the psychology of it..." He turned a self-deprecating smile to Raylan, "And I know how you love psychology," he teased. He took a breath. "She survived my father too. And right when she found out that her husband was a monster, she was frozen out by her so-called friends and her family, left alone with her liquor cabinet and two kids, one of whom was left weird and damaged and she blames herself for that. All the looking down her nose and bossing people around is her way of trying to stay in control of her life somehow." He held up a hand. "I'm not saying it's good choices, but it is what it is. She means well. She tries."

[tinstar]

Raylan managed a tight little pull of his lips. "I'm startin' too," he quipped before Malcolm went on, face settling back into seriousness.

"She cares about you both. That much is clear." A beat passed. "I don't take that kind of direction well. She was lucky to get me there at all and that's only because of you." If he hadn't known Malcolm the way he did, Jessica would have been sorely disappointed.

"Tim would have a hayday with me in this suit."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm smiled softly.

"I think you look nice," he said simply. Possibly not as nice as he looked in a worn pair of jeans...

He shook that thought off as the taxi pulled up in front of his building and he handed the driver some money.

As they got out, Malcolm fished his keys out of his pocket.

[tinstar]

Raylan smiled back as money exchanged hands and he slipped out of the car after Malcolm. Once Malcolm unlocked the door and led the way up the stairs, he locked the door behind them and followed. When they got to the top landing, Raylan grabbed Malcolm's elbow to stop him as he stepped up onto the landing with him.

"Look, about tonight.." Hazel eyes moved back and forth between Malcolm's. What the hell was he thinking? What the hell else was he going to say? The hand on Malcolm's arm had been a bad idea; it was a gateway touch. Something that he'd done to countless other men without the same shot of adrenaline to his veins. Or the sudden swell of scotch and tension. The only hint of what was coming was the briefest glance down at Malcolm's lips before he was pushing forward, roughly stealing a kiss as he pushed him against the door with a hungry, almost drunk weight.

[abrightboy]

Whatever some part of Malcolm may have wanted, that wasn't what he was expecting, but however slightly startling it was, it was also...amazing. Only the briefest beat passed before he leaned in, returning the kiss, one hand curling around Raylan's lapel while the other splayed on the door by his hip to steady him.

[tinstar]

In that brief moment, Raylan was almost sure that he'd made a stupid choice, that Malcolm would shove him off and send him to apologizing and gathering his things to find a hotel elsewhere. But instead, Malcolm was leaning into him and encouraging the impossible. His hand found Malcolm's jaw, keeping him close as Raylan enjoyed the taste of scotch and him in an indulgent moment.

He broke it a moment later with a roll of their foreheads, a little breathless for his own bravery, eyes closed for a moment.

"Sorry," he muttered, already feeling foolish for his lapse in judgement but not letting Malcolm go just yet. "I didn't mean-"

[abrightboy]

He frowned faintly. It hadn't felt like something someone ought to apologize for... oh.

He huffed a faint self-deprecating laugh, releasing his grip on Raylan's lapel and running a hand down his chest to smooth it out, but not making any other attempt to move away. He wouldn't describe himself as 'touch-starved', but he certainly was that and he wasn't rushing to get away from a moment that looked about to end anyway.

"Regret already," he said with forced lightness. "Might be a new record."

[tinstar]

It did to Raylan. What business did he have doing that? What world was he in where he had? He couldn't answer either of those questions and as stupid as it was, he didn't move beyond sliding his hands down Malcolm's arms.

"No," he replied with a bit of husky roughness in his voice. "Not regret. Just whiskey. And impolite assumptions," he tried to assure, mind still circling around how the kiss felt. "I've never kissed a guy before," he admitted between them. It felt better saying it there, like that, then some hardline stance that he was already wavering on in the street that would sound sharper and worse.

[abrightboy]

He did notice that, while that was something to unpack, Raylan hadn't stepped out of his space, either.

And he didn't know where to start.

"...Impolite?" A beat. "I'm... not sure what to make of that. I..." He gestured with his finger between them. "I wasn't protesting." He considered Raylan's face for a moment. The fact that this was the first time it had been this close was a little distracting. "You've just never done it or you've never wanted to? Are you worried about what that means?" He tilted his head slightly, his eyes still searching for something in his features. "It's normal. Wanting to, sometimes. And worrying about what it means. They're both normal."

[tinstar]

Raylan couldn't help but smile softly at Malcolm's confusion. "No you were not." Quite nicely, as a matter of fact. But he still shouldn't be going around kissing people he works with and as Malcolm comes around to another corner of the nook of that problem, Raylan's smile faded.

It might have been normal for everyone else, Raylan wasn't one to have an opinion on it - what people did behind their own doors is their own business - but when it came to himself, adapting the same kind of idea was more than difficult.

"Either. Both." All of it. Raylan let his eyes wander Malcolm's face a little before coming back to his eyes. "It's not normal for me." Or where he came from. "You're not normal for me." He swallowed thickly. "And I still don't regret it."

Whatever that meant in the end.

[abrightboy]

And I still don't regret it.

That registered and a hint of a smile returned to his face, his hand still resting on Raylan's chest. Then he leaned in to press a new kiss to Raylan's mouth, tentatively, in case not regretting it did not commute to wanting it to happen again.

[tinstar]

This was probably a better pace than the hurried faux bravery Raylan had chosen in the moment and he met it with a little less fever than before, hands slipping around Malcolm, one finding its way under his jacket to get a palm closer to the skin hidden underneath. Raylan felt like he was a teenager again, making out in a dark corner of some high school stairwell, but this wasn't high school and Malcolm wasn't some cheerleader looking for a good time.

After a few seconds, Raylan deepened the kiss with a little rumble from the back of his throat, losing himself to his own impulses a little bit. He couldn't help it; there was no arguing how good it or Malcolm felt, or how good it felt, in the moment, to not be holding the impulse back under a firm country bootheel.

[abrightboy]

Malcolm opened up to the kiss, his hand sliding from Raylan's chest up into his hair. God, he'd wanted to touch it for a while now.

He'd have been pleased if he knew Raylan felt safe enough, in Malcolm's apartment, to feel what he felt.

And to act on it.

When the kiss broke for a breath, Malcolm didn't pull away, but he lifted his head slightly to find Raylan's eyes.

"Is this okay?" he murmured.

[tinstar]

Raylan felt a little uneven and lightheaded when the kiss broke, and he was glad for the door that was helping hold them up.

"Yeah," he replied softly, meeting Malcolm's gaze with a little pull of his smile. "This is okay." And it was, though he was glad that Malcolm didn't share this stairwell with anyone else. "We should probably make it through this door at some point.."

Not that he was moving to do anything other than close the fraction of space between their faces to kiss Malcolm again, just as happy to linger in the embrace and gently explore this jump he'd taken.

[abrightboy]

Right, his apartment door had another side with... furniture and things... Raylan was very distracting and the kiss was stirring butterflies in his stomach and it had been quite a while since anything had been quite this exciting in his personal life. Apart from the one night with Eve before Christmas - which was a disaster he tried not to think about - he would have to do math to figure out the last time he'd been with anyone and he didn't have the mental faculties for that at the moment.

He brought his free hand up around Raylan's shoulder, still holding his keys, which jingled against his palm before being muted by Raylan's jacket. Raylan's hand under his jacket urged him to arch his back a little, pressing against Raylan a little bit more as the kiss got more eager.

[tinstar]

Taking Malcolm's weight a little, Raylan's left hand found its way under Malcolm's jacket so one could spread up towards his shoulders as the other spread down towards his ass, encouraging the press of him as Raylan's tongue flicked across and between Malcolm's lips. Raylan wasn't sure what exactly he wanted beyond more but the growing length in his too fine pants certainly wasn't his gun.

Before Raylan really registered it, his hands were tugging and pulling Malcolm's shirt free, hungry to feel more of the younger man's skin and there was a little sound of throaty victory as his fingers got their first taste.

[abrightboy]

Oh. That was great, his fingers on Malcolm's skin. Were... were they going to do this right here in the stairwell?

Well. They could.

God, Raylan was a good kisser. His mouth was distracting. His grip was so firm and commanding.

Open the door, Bright, he told himself, but his tone was somewhat less firm and commanding than Raylan's hands and he began pushing the expensive tux jacket off Raylan's shoulders instead.

[tinstar]

Somehow, the assurance that this was normal to someone, somewhere, namely the man in his arms, had allowed Raylan to go on something of an autopilot. One arm was traded for the other as he let Malcolm push the jacket off, their kiss broken only for a half breath of air before one or the other leaned back forward like they were in some competition to see who could out kiss who. Between the motions, Raylan pulled the rest of Malcolm's shirt free, letting him run his hands up the fit angles of Malcolm's back.

"Door," he managed, just as roughly as before, just as futilely for a half second as he kept Malcolm against him until he pushed him away at the hips, eyes dark and promising that this wasn't going to be their last touch. "Before you make me do something terrible in this stairwell."

No, he didn't know what. Seemed to be the theme of the night but Raylan had just enough scotch and need and protective fury under his belt that it didn't matter. He could look at it all in the light of the morning. Later.

[abrightboy]

Breathless, it took Malcolm the space of several panted breaths to gather enough functioning braincells to understand that.

"Door," he repeated with a very vague hand gesture, turning around and fumbling the key into the lock, pushing the door open and letting them inside the apartment. He threw his keys in the bootrack on the floor just inside and kicked his shoes there, too, turning around once Raylan made it in to put the chain on.

He did not need his mother walking in tonight. No, thank you.

Once that was taken care of, he turned to look at Raylan, not completely sure whether he would want to just... carry on now that a little bit of space had made its way between them.

Maybe he wanted Malcolm, still. Maybe he wanted that glass of scotch. Or maybe he wanted a combination of those things in one order or another.

[tinstar]

Malcolm looked far too good like that, lips hinting towards kiss bruised, eyes wide and wild and a little high on their contact. He looked the way Raylan felt. Tugging his bowtie loose, pausing to scoop up his jacket, unbuttoning the top two buttons as he did so, Raylan followed Malcolm in, eyes coming back to the man as he locked the chain behind them.

That was it. Two doors behind them and a night full of choices ahead of him. The heat in the stairwell still felt like a raw wildfire between them and he hadn't quite caught his breath. There wasn't much of any place to throw his jacket, so Raylan opted for the stairs without looking.

"I'm almost ten years older than you." He didn't move but he was spring coiled again, much like he'd gotten at dinner, but with a whole different intent as he worked over the obstacles that his brain was throwing in his path. His statement, while posed as such, wasn't one. It was another ask for permission, to be allowed to still want Malcolm.

[abrightboy]

"But I've kissed a man before." He paused and leaned forward slightly. "Is this a game or a contest?" he clarified, then turned to grab a couple of crystal tumblers out of the cupboard.

He put them on the island and took a breath, running a hand through his hair. What was he doing? Oh yeah. Scotch. He turned again to grab the bottle off the counter and poured about two fingers in each glass. Instead of sliding it across the counter to Raylan, he walked around the counter and set it in his hands.

From possibly slightly closer than he would have set it there earlier that day.