Zed's glass touched his lips, yet his voice slipped through the rim, calm and cutting like a blade through silk.
"Tie him up."
No name. No glance. Just the command, and it echoed like thunder.
Thanos blinked, already breathless, but something in that voice hit him deeper than sound. His fingers moved before thought could stop them, instinct tangled with temptation. The ropes, soft, silken, and far too eager, slid like serpents across Nigel's skin, coiling in ritual.
Wrists behind his back. Ankles bound just enough to stagger his stance. Loops kissed the curve of his waist, chest, thighs, then knotted into a sinful, delicate bow right at the center of his body. A gift not to unwrap, but to admire.
Nigel? He didn't resist.
He breathed out, a shaky, beautiful offering, as if surrender had always been stitched into his skin.
Zed leaned back into the couch, exhaling slowly, the glass clinking softly against the armrest. His gaze? It didn't just undress; it possessed.
And now, with Nigel, a ribboned present trembling under candlelight, the stage was his.
"Now let's see if you're worthy of being unwrapped," he murmured, like a storm cloaked in velvet.
Thanos stepped back, breathing hard, not from exhaustion, but from the pressure building in his chest. The ropes had transformed Nigel into something else entirely. Not just a man. Not just a body. But a shrine of temptation. Velvet-bowed. Delicately shivering.
Zed said nothing. He didn't need to.
The silence dragged, thick with heat.
And then--
"Kiss him."
It wasn't a suggestion.
It wasn't kind.
It was a spark dropped into a powder keg.
Thanos didn't look at Zed. He didn't need to. His eyes locked onto Nigel's, those wide, glassy windows trembling beneath the flicker of candlelight.
And Nigel? He tilted his chin upward, just enough. Offering himself.
Their lips met, not gentle, not rough. Just… necessary. Urgent. Like they were trying to devour the silence itself. And the more they melted into each other, the more Zed's fingers tightened around his glass. Watching. Always watching.
When Nigel moaned, Zed's breath caught. When Thanos's hand tangled in that ribboned waist, Zed's knuckles whitened.
The room pulsed.
And somewhere in that delicious friction of lips and breath, of held-back gasps and curling toes, Zed felt. Not just a statue. Not just a voyeur. But something alive.
He stood up.
Glass down. Robe loose. Shadows licking the edge of his jaw.
"Now move."
Not just a command.
A summons.
Thanos was no longer just moving, he was performing. But not for Zed, not for any unseen eyes. His every breath, every thrust, was a declaration.
"Mine."
He didn't say it aloud. He didn't have to.
The way his fingers gripped Nigel's hips, tight enough to leave bruises that looked like brands. The way he leaned in, not just to touch but to conquer. His mouth moved across Nigel's chest like a man starved, tongue flicking, nipping, worshipping, claiming.
And Nigel, Nigel responded like a puppet stringed to Thanos' rhythm. His fingers twisted in the sheets, head thrown back, the ribbon at his throat fluttering with each tremble.
Zed's grip on the armrest tightened.
It was raw, unscripted, real.
Thanos shifted Nigel's thigh, angled him just right, and drove forward with such precision that Nigel cried out, a cry that wasn't pain, wasn't forced, but something purer. Like pleasure in its wildest, unchained form. It echoed, danced across the walls like music only Zed could truly hear.
That was the moment something snapped in Zed.
He felt the pulse, his chest clenched, his breath staggered. Not yet. Not yet. He held on, drank it in. He had to see more.
Thanos leaned in, pressing his forehead to Nigel's. "You're mine tonight," he breathed against his lips, and Nigel, still gasping, still trembling, whispered, "Take me then."
Zed's mouth parted. His throat tightened.
He watched them, two silhouettes tangled in lust, the shadows painting their bodies in the flickering light. And the way Nigel clung to Thanos, legs wrapped, arms trembling, it was submission, yes, but not weakness. It was trust.
Thanos's gaze flicked to Zed just once. Just once.
And Zed felt it. Like he was being pulled into their fire. Like the moment no longer belonged to them, but to him, too. Their pleasure became his, their rhythm his heartbeat, their gasps his own breath.
Nigel cried out again, and Thanos followed, buried deep, head thrown back, moaning Nigel's name like a prayer and a curse all in one.
Zed's hand trembled. The glass slipped from his fingers, landed against the rug with a thud, untouched by shatter but heavy with meaning.
He stood, robe loosening, his frame caught in the firelight.
Then it happened--
The ripple.
The wave.
The gush.
No contact, no touch. Just pure, soul-deep release. His breath cracked. A choked sound. His knees hit the couch, body bent forward.
He'd watched men pretend. He'd orchestrated dozens. He'd tried, and tried, and failed to feel what he so carefully commanded.
But this--
This was lightning.
This was what he waited for.
This was real.
And it belonged to him.
Not because he directed it.
But because they gave it to him.