'...it's four in the morning
and once more the dawning
has woke up the wanting in me...'
(Faron Young)

"Hi! It's me."

Woken by a startlingly loud ring of the telephone, Doyle blinks. He rubs a hand over his face, feeling hard stubble scrape at his palm, and squints blearily at the illuminated figures on the clock radio by his bed.

"Bodie? What's wrong? Are you okay?"

"Everything's fine. I just can't sleep. I thought maybe we could...talk?"

Wide awake now, Doyle frowns at the phone while pushing himself farther up the bed so he can lean back against the headboard. "Have you any idea what time it is, you mad bastard? It's four am!"

"I know what time it is. To the last second. I've been counting every one of 'em for hours."

"Well, tough! You've just woken me from the first good kip I've had all week."

"Been missing me, have you?" There is more than a hint of smugness in the question.

"I've been bloody tired, if you must know. The Old Man's had me runnin' round in circles down 'ere while you've been playin' Mister Macho up in Liverpool. I've been too knackered even to sleep, most of the time. I haven't had time to miss you!"

"Oh."

The wealth of disappointment in that one word brings a tiny twitch to one corner of Doyle's mouth. Involuntarily his tone softens. "But somehow I've managed to do it just the same."

"Ah!" Satisfaction rather than disappointment this time. Then, with the familiar hint of shyness which Doyle has always found endearing, "Been missing you, too. Life just isn't the same without that ugly mug of yours hanging around. Kept thinking of things I wanted to say to you then remembering you're over two hundred miles away."

"Me too. I got almost halfway through a joke yesterday before I realised I was tellin' it to thin air. Pathetic, innit?" Doyle's mouth curves into a wry grin. "Yeah. Two grown men..."

"I know."

"It just seems like such a long time since I heard your voice," Bodie confesses quietly after a brief, shared silence. "It's been a little bit of hell having to keep cover all week, not being able to call you. Been lying here tonight, thinking about you, till I thought 'oh, what the hell'. I needed to talk to you so damn much! I tried to stop meself, but I couldn't. Sorry I woke you."

A small flower of warmth blossoms in Doyle's chest. "Don't be; I'll get over it. Truth be told, I'm glad you did. I've been longing to hear your voice too."

"You have?"

"Idiot! I do love you, y'know."

There is the telling sound of a caught breath, then: "Me too!"

Doyle smiles and settles the receiver more comfortably against his ear. "Narcissist."

A chuckle tickles his eardrum. "You trying to trip me up with long words again, Doyle? I didn't mean it that way and you know it."

"So how did you mean it?" Teasing.

"I meant I love you too." Mildly exasperated.

"That's all right, then. What's not to love?"

Bodie snorts. "Y'know, one of the things I've always liked about you is your innate modesty."

"If you've got it, flaunt it," Doyle tells him complacently, then adds, "So, why is it like pullin' teeth to get you to say the words?"

"We-ell...you know what they say about actions speaking louder and all that stuff..."

Doyle shivers, but not with cold. A memory surfaces: himself spread-eagled on the bed in which he lies, half out of his mind on sensory overload while Bodie uses mouth and hands in an attempt to drive him completely over the edge. The expression on the handsome face leaning over him, the reverence in every touch lavished on his aching flesh, are eloquent of a depth of emotion of which many would judge Bodie incapable.

Doyle, who understands his partner and lover better, more deeply, than anyone else, knows that judgement would be very, very mistaken.

"And your actions shout it to high heaven, lover," he says now, his voice slightly husky. "But a bloke needs to hear it sometimes, too."

"In that case, just for you I'll make the effort to say it again. Properly, this time," Bodie murmurs across the separating miles. "I love you, Ray Doyle. Always have done, always will."

Doyle shivers again, harder. The warmth in his chest expands, suffusing his whole body, and he resorts to teasing again without really judging his words. "Gosh, twice in one night! I don't believe this!"

"You impugning me or what?" With a hint of laughter.

"Impugning? Now who's using long words? Been readin' a dictionary, have you?"

"Nah, comes from listening to you spouting off all the time." Bodie's voice drops to a deep, black velvet purr. "Let me tell you, sunshine, where you're concerned, twice a night I can do with me eyes shut. Any time, any place."

The overt sexual innuendo tingles through every one of Doyle's nerves and goes straight to his groin. God, he'd walked into that one all right! He bites back a groan as his body springs urgently to life.

"Bodie!"

"Ray?" All innocence.

"Bastard."

"Getting to you, am I?"

Doyle groans aloud, unable to hold it back this time. "You know you are, dammit! Every time. You turn me on like a bloody floodlight, every single time..." He wills his recalcitrant erect flesh to subside, but it does the exact opposite. "God, Bodie, what the hell am I goin' to do with a hard-on at four o'clock in the morning?"

After a moment of speechlessness Bodie laughs outright. "I don't believe I just heard you say that, Doyle!"

"I don't believe I heard me say it either," Doyle admits ruefully. "I put it down to the state you've got me into."

"Oh that's right, blame it all on me! Typical, that is!"

"Is there someone else I should blame it on? Oh God, I wish you were here, love. If you were, I'd know exactly what to do with it."

"And I wouldn't do a thing to stop you." Bodie's voice sinks back into that toe-curling velvet purr. "I wish I was there too, sweetheart. I love seeing you when you're turned on, all flushed and heavy-eyed. Makes me want you even more than I usually do. And I love the taste of you, and the smell of you. It's unique...wonderful...like every Christmas and birthday I've ever had all rolled into one. The world on a platter, just for me. Wish I could be there with you."

"Oh god!"

Of its own volition, Doyle's hand creeps down the length of his body, pushing the bedcovers aside. It settles on the throbbing heat of his genitals, squeezes them gently, then harder, strokes the swollen length of his cock and discovers a seeping drop of moisture at the tip. His breathing quickens.

"Let's pretend we're together, Ray..."

Almost as though Bodie can see what is happening his voice deepens even more, its dark velvet surrounding Doyle and shutting out everything except its own warm murmur in his ear and the demands of his body as he is aroused even further.

"Pretend I'm there, in bed with you. Holding you, touching you. Pretend your hands are my hands, Ray. Touch yourself the way you like me to touch you. Pretend I'm kissing you. On your mouth...you've got such a sexy mouth, Ray, if I died kissing it I'd die happy. Then pretend I'm moving on down to your chest...you've got such sensitive nipples it drives you wild when I lick them and suck them and nibble on them, doesn't it? Pretend I'm doing that, lover..."

Doyle's breath rasps in his throat, and he whimpers as the net of magic is woven around him by the voice murmuring from the receiver tucked between shoulder and ear. The fingers of his left hand play with his nipples, rolling and pinching them in imitation of Bodie's words. Sweat dampens his skin. His right hand has found a steadily increasing rhythm between his splayed thighs, and the scent of his own arousal prickles his nostrils.

"Let's pretend..." The dark sorcery continues to whisper to him; although it is tempting, it is almost redundant now. "Pretend I've moved down to your belly, Ray. Pretend I've dipped my tongue into your navel and swirled it around, and I've spread your thighs and now I'm going down on your cock. You've got a beautiful cock, sweetheart, so big, so elegant. Just looking at it, touching it, makes my mouth water. I love to kiss it, Ray. I love to take it in my mouth and taste it, taste it when you come. I've never tasted anything even half as good as your come, love. Never!"

Doyle's hand is almost a blur now as the force gathers inside him and builds inexorably towards orgasm. His hips are thrusting upwards with ever-increasing speed and strength, and he is making small noises - more whimpers, gasps, moans of self-pleasuring that are growing in volume until all at once his body convulses and seems to explode.

With a long-drawn-out cry of "Bo-o-odie!" he comes at last, hot fluid spurting out of him to splatter on belly and chest and finally trickle over fingers and hand.

Aeons later he fumbles weakly for the receiver which has slipped down onto the pillow beside him and props it back on his shoulder with a shaking hand.

"Bodie?" he whispers into the soughing silence. "Bodie?"

"I'm here."

Doyle clears his throat. "That was...was...indescribable."

"That good, huh?"

"Better."

A soft chuckle drifts down the line connecting them. "We aim to please," Bodie murmurs.

"You succeeded." Doyle swallows convulsively. "I've never tried this phone sex lark before. It's quite...something."

"Certainly sounded like you were enjoying it with all that moaning and thrashing about!" there is more gentle amusement in Bodie's voice. "That's another thing I like about you, the way you appreciate all my efforts so very vocally."

Doyle smothers a tiny chuckle of his own. "The labourer is always worthy of his hire," he says sedately. "And in this case, your labours were quite spectacular, lover. So, how'd you come up with the idea?"

"Much as I'd like to, I can't take the credit," Bodie tells him regretfully. "Had a bird who did it to me once. Nearly bust a gut, if I remember correctly. Thought you'd like it too, randy toad that you are."

"Like it? Understatement of the year, that," Doyle confesses throatily, and then adds belatedly, "But what about you, love? Are you...can I...?"

Bodie's voice sinks back into dark intimacy. "You don't have to do a thing, sunshine, not just now. This was all for you - only for you. I can wait. Next time it happens to me, I want to be deep inside you, Ray, or have you inside me. Either way blows my mind."

Despite its sated state, Doyle's body gives an aching throb. "Jesus, Bodie" Don't say things like that!"

"Not even if I mean 'em? Pushed a button again, did I?"

Doyle groans. "Of course you pushed a bloody button, you moron, only I'm still all worn out from before. You tryin' to kill me or what?"

"Nah, I want you alive - very much alive." That velvet, soft-smooth voice is like a caress to every single one of Doyle's nerve-endings. "I'm just priming you, lover. You're a fever in my blood, Ray Doyle, a fever I can't live without and wouldn't cure if I could. I want you all the time but especially I want to see you all hot'n'bothered, waiting for me when I get home tomorrow."

Doyle catches his breath. "You're coming home? Tomorrow? The op's finished?"

"Almost all wrapped up. A couple of hours in the morning should do it, then I'll be on my way back to civilisation and you."

"Bastard! Why didn't you say so sooner?"

"Was having too much fun." Doyle can hear the grin in Bodie's voice. "Forgiven, Ray?"

"Dunno why I should, but I always do. Bastard," Doyle says again but without rancour, his mind spinning with the delightful anticipation of having Bodie back where he belongs. "What time tomorrow?"

"Late afternoon probably. Got to see the Old Man, do reports, all that boring stuff. You know how it is. See you at HQ?"

"Aaaah...no, you won't. I'm out all day with Murph. Babysitting." Disgust, and disappointment.

"Then I'll come round to your place later. Okay?"

"Very."

"Keep yourself warm for me, angelfish." Then softly, so softly that Doyle has to strain to hear it just before the phone is put down at the other end: "I love you."

Three times in one night!

Doyle replaces his own receiver and slides down under the covers, wrapped in a warm cocoon of well-being, satiety and delight.

Three times in one night Bodie has said the words, actually said 'I love you' as opposed to simply showing it.

A record. It has to be a definite, beautiful record.

And tomorrow he will be home. Home, where Doyle can see him, hold him, know he is safe. Tomorrow night they will make love again. Properly. Bodie's hands will touch Doyle, and Doyle's hands will touch Bodie. Their mouths will taste one another, their bodies join with one another, and afterwards they will go to sleep wrapped in one another's arms.

As it has been, as it should be, as it will be. For the rest of their lives, if he has anything to do with it.

For the first time in a very long week Doyle slides down into sleep easily, peacefully, with a contented little smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

And two hundred and fifteen miles away, in a scruffy hotel bedroom in Liverpool, Bodie does likewise.

-- THE END --

Originally published in Discovered in a Letterbox 6, June 1998