GOTCHA!

235

by Terri Beckett writing as “Teleny”

Originally published in THE Starsky and Hutch slash letterzine, Hanky-Panky #2 in 1982.

 

A horseback ride interrupted by a sudden storm brings long simmering tensions between Starsky and Hutch to a boiling point.

---

“Some great idea this was,” Starsky muttered sourly. “Horseback riding, you said. Fresh air and exercise, you said. Crap.”

“For Chrissakes, Starsk. It’s only a summer shower. Quit bitchin’, It’ll be over in a few minutes.”

“Sure, sure.” Starsky turned away from him to stand at the barn door and glower at the downpour. I’ll tell you something else that’s over, Lover-Boy. “My ass is sore, and my legs hurt. We’ve been riding for two hours. Two fuckin’ hours.”

“You’re out of condition,” Hutch said easily. “Come on, lighten up, huh?”

Starsky gave him a distinctly nasty look, easing the tight denim over his buttocks, wincing.

“Okay for you to say. That goddam horse has a backbone like the Rocky Mountains.”

“You picked it out, babe. Might have known you’d go for the flashiest job in the stables.” Hutch grinned, his eyes on the blue-encased area receiving Starsky’s attentions. Starsky had also made a comment to the effect that he kind of liked palominos, which had, as intended, made Hutch blush. “You weren’t complaining earlier, anyway, when you were playing ‘shoot-’em-up’ along the valley trail. Besides, you wouldn’t feel its backbone through the saddle.”

“I could,” Starsky snapped, still massaging his ass with tender care.

Hutch regarded him thoughtfully. His partner was being unnecessarily obtuse.

The barn where they had taken shelter when the squall hit might be a somewhat ramshackle affair, but it was conveniently distanced from the trail they’d been riding, and there was an abundance of hay loosely heaped around in the dimness of the deserted stalls. The two hired-horses—his own handsome gray and Starsky’s fancy-looking palomino—nosed quietly into the armfuls of hay Hutch had spread for them, oblivious to the unmistakably chilly atmosphere between their riders.

“You should get more riding,” Hutch said, wandering around the place. Various kinds of junk adorned odd corners—there was even an ancient buckboard, festooned with scraps of redundant harness. “It’ll do you a world of good.”

“Bullshit,” Starsky retorted. “You may well get off on pounding your ass on leather, but I sure as hell don’t. Summer shower, huh?” he went on, before the ambiguity of his last sentence had fully registered with Hutch. “More like the Second Deluge.”

“Bitch, bitch, bitch.” Hutch smiled, joining him in the doorway, one hand reaching out to rest on the nape of Starsky’s neck, caressingly. If you want persuading, babe, I’ll persuade… “So we can’t ride in the rain—I’m sure we could find a way to pass the time?”

“Sure we could.” Starsky hunched away. “We could play Monopoly, but I forgot the fuckin’ board. Any more smart ideas?”

“Well—”

“If it involves gettin’ your rocks off, you can forget it.”

“That hay looks real comfortable,” Hutch pointed out, not willing to give up the line he’d taken.

“I just declared Lent on you.”

“What? That’s not in your religion,” still smiling.

“Back off!” Starsky snarled, and walked away from him to the further door post, leaned there, brooding malevolently at the weather.

Hutch rubbed his hand through his hair, sighing. It wasn’t just the weather. Things had been getting difficult between them for a while. No—not things—Starsky had been getting difficult. May as well kick it out into the open. Can’t go on like this.

“What’s with you, Starsk?” he demanded. “You’ve been in a lousy mood all week. If I didn’t know better, I’d think it was the time of the month.”

“Funny guy, huh?”

“Well, either you’ve got a headache, or you have a date, or you’re too damn tired, or it’s something else—”

“Yeah. Well. Maybe it’s somethin’ else. So get used to it.”

There was a silence. Starsky shot a glance over his shoulder, a kind of satisfaction in him at Hutch’s expression. Gotcha there, didn’t I?

“What do you mean by that?” There was an edge of anger in Hutch’s voice.

“You figure it out,” Starsky said. His mood of discontent had reached the point where he had decided to act on it—and now was as good a time as any. I’m tired, yeah. Damn tired of being taken for granted, always being available, answerin’ to your whistle like a goddamn trained poodle. “You think you’re the only one who can hand it out for me?” he added, coolly deliberate, eyes and mouth and stance taunting, relishing the suddenly pale incredulous face of his partner. Oh, yeah, right on target!

“What in hell’s name does that mean?” Hutch whispered.

Starsky showed his teeth. “What do you think? Lover-Boy?” And he turned away.

A hand on his shoulder spun him round, a fist bunched in his shirtfront.

“Who?” Hutch yelled. “Goddamn it—!”

“Get your hands off me!” Starsky wrenched free. “You don’t own me—”

He didn’t finish. Knuckles cracked on the point of his jaw, sending him reeling back dazed—

Hutch hauled him up by the lapels. “Who?”

“Go to hell.” Starsky gasped, trying to gather coordination, rubber-kneed, head spinning. Another blow, open-handed this time, landed across his face.

“Who?” Hutch’s furious features wavered as he blinked, trying to focus.

“You don’t own me—”

“You bastard!” Hutch hissed between set teeth. “You two-timing cheap-assed bastard!”

He let go, and Starsky sat down hard, attempting to get his legs under him and failing. Something was trickling from his lower lip—he wiped at it with the back of his hand, obscurely surprised to see blood.

“Always some excuse, wasn’t there? I’ve always got to be there for you, but it’s a one-way street in your book, isn’t it? Have I ever turned up on your doorstep when you got a date to go to, and driven you crazy for me? How many girls have I had to stand up because you reckoned you got a prior claim? I got news for you, boy. You don’t hold out on me in anything. Who is it?”

Starsky spat blood into the hay, wondering if he could manage to stand yet, and if Hutch was likely to hit him again if he did. He wasn’t sure about either, which was unnerving. He decided to chance both eventualities.

“I’m leaving,” he announced, getting shakily to his knees—

Hutch stood over him. “Uh-huh. You’re not going anywhere until you tell me who it is.”

“Yeah? An’ how you gonna stop me?” Starsky jeered, unwisely, finding that he could stand if he braced himself against the buckboard.

“Any way I have to,” Hutch said, voice taut.

“Oh, terrific. Mr. Machismo.” Starsky pushed himself off, aiming for the horses and walking straight into Hutch’s fist again. This time it connected neatly and economically with his midriff, the impact doubling him forward, folding him into the piled hay, breath whistling from his lungs.

Hutch followed him down, using his weight to keep him pinned, and caught one flailing arm, forcing it back and using a length of discarded harness-strapping to tie Starsky’s wrist to the lower rim of the buckboard wheel. He repeated the process with the other wrist before rising to his knees and regarding his prisoner.

Still winded, gasping for air and half-dazed, Starsky did not appreciate his new position until he tried to sit up—and found that he couldn’t. Blue eyes, wide with astonishment, flew to Hutch’s face.

“Hutch—?”

“Any way I have to, I said. And I meant it,” Hutch answered grimly. “You tell me who, and I’ll let you up. Maybe.”

“For Chrissakes, Hutch. This isn’t funny.”

“Neither is you two-timing me.” The eyes were chips of azure ice, the wide mouth a hard line. “God damn it, Starsky, I don’t take this from anyone—and that goes double for you.”

More than a little alarmed by what he had precipitated, Starsky tugged experimentally against the leather—but it held. Dry and cracked, it fitted about his wrists like cuffs of metal, and the lashings were too tight and too expert for him to twist or slip himself free.

Hutch, watching him, was losing the look of tension and anger. There was an expression of dawning satisfaction under the bitterness and pain still left with him, and he sat back on his heels.

Again, uselessly, Starsky jerked at his bonds. “Can’t you take a joke?” he demanded, trying for an injured tone.

“If that’s what you call a joke, your sense of humor needs adjusting,” Hutch said levelly. “And it’s no good you struggling, either. Knots are something they teach you in the Sea Scouts. You’re stuck like that until I decide to untie you.” His eyes traveled the length of his partner’s body, from the pinioned wrists to the sprawl of denim-clad legs and back again. Slowly he began to smile. “Which may not be yet. You look kinda interesting like that.”

Starsky shivered. There was a constriction under his ribs that made breathing difficult. The hay rustled under him as he shifted—the sheer helplessness of his position slid a cold fear into him, and belatedly he regretted his impulse to hurt.

“I don’t get off on bondage,” he said, hearing a tremor in his own voice and not sure exactly what he was feeling, apart from fear. “Hey, Hutch, c’mon, willya? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“Shut up,” Hutch told him, brusquely. He bent to pull off first one of Starsky’s boots, then the other. Vigorous kicks failed to dissuade him.

“Hutch—what are you—”

“I said shut up.”

Hands on his belt buckle, the rasp of the zipper, cool air on his skin as his jeans were peeled down. And a soft laugh. “If you don’t get off on bondage, babe, what’s all this?” Warm hand cupping his groin, brushing lightly over sensitive flesh, making him gasp. Hutch’s weight descended on him, the bulge of denim-covered erection pressing into his belly, his own throbbing now with an arousal he could not conceal. Hutch’s mouth claimed his, tongue thrusting, and the taste of his own blood was startlingly erotic. He gave in to the quicksilver pulse of sensation, letting his body move under Hutch’s, savoring the dominant strength of his lover—moaned softly as Hutch licked at the split lip.

“There’s no way you’re gonna hold out on me,” Hutch said. “Understand?”

“Mmmm…” The hay rustled as he moved his hips. “Okay. Whatever. Now untie me, huh, an’ let’s—”

“No,” Hutch murmured. “You’re gonna stay like that.” He rolled off Starsky, got rid of riding boots and jeans, and knelt between his partner’s spread thighs. “Because I gotcha, babe. I do own you. Just like you own me. You think I don’t know what you’ve been trying to pull, these last few weeks? Oh, sure, it’s okay for you to come on around to my place when you want a good fuck, but when I call you, it’s no dice. And now telling me there’s someone else—that’s no deal. You’re not getting away with it.”

“Hutch—” Starsky was desperate, body taut now with need, straining upward for the touch denied to him. He was never more aware of his own helplessness and vulnerability, bound as he was, and it was a profoundly disturbing feeling, frightening in its intensity.

“Wait.” Hutch slipped his shirt from his shoulders, tossed it to one side. “You want to make me jealous? You got it. I don’t share you. Not with any other guy. You’re mine. Understand me?” He leaned forward, arching his body over Starsky’s, just out of contact. “You hear me, David Michael Starsky? You think I’m gonna make love to you. Well, you’re wrong.”

As if mesmerized, the dark blue eyes were fixed on his face, glazing with desire—the body under his quivered, and he lowered himself fractionally, rotating his hips so that the heavy, engorged column of flesh circled Starsky’s. A spasm shook the captive, a groan of pleading.

“Gonna tell me who?”

“Oh Christ, Hutch, there’s no one, please—”

“Just a joke, huh?” Absently, ignoring the increasingly frantic writhings, Hutch pulled Starsky’s shirt open, bared the dark-pelted chest and bent his head to tease the nipple erect with his tongue, finding the other with his fingers.

Starsky was moaning aloud, head thrashing from side to side, bound hands clenching, but it won him no compassion.

“Start laughing, Starsky. I’m not gonna make love to you,” Hutch repeated, whispering the words into the panting mouth. “But I’m gonna fuck you, my tiger, and make you come like you’ve never come before, and show you just how much I do own you…”

Another tremor ran through the sweat-glossed bronze body and Starsky turned his head to one side, eyes tight shut, as if trying to deny what was happening to him. Body language—in the contest between equals, it is the signal of submission to expose the throat.

Hutch gave a quiet chuckle and bit into the smooth flesh, the pain making his victim jerk. Then he gripped the stubborn jaw, forcing his head round, taking his mouth in a ruthless kiss, making him taste again the salt of his own blood. “Look at me, damn you!” he commanded, and the long lashes lifted. Holding the clouded indigo eyes with his own, he slid his hands under the lean buttocks, lifting, positioning—a single powerful thrust, piercing, impaling—Starsky’s spine arching as he choked out a scream.

“Ohgodyes—Hutch—” Legs locking around Hutch’s waist as Hutch moved in him, penetrating deeper.

“You’re mine. Every part of you. I own you.”

Body shuddering under each impact. “—please—ohgodHutch—”

Strophe antistrophe, feral, atonal, punctuated by straining asps, a groan of protest as Hutch pulled back.

“I can do whatever I want to you…” he whispered. making it a statement of fact, holding down his own desire with a hard-won control. Starsky was beyond denying anything.

“Yes—whatever—Hutchplease—”

“You belong to me.” Irrevocable as a brand on his flesh. “Say it!”

“I—belong to you.” A sob on the edge of delirium. “Hutch. Please. Now. Don’t leave me like this—needyounow—I can’t—”

“No one else?”

“No one. OhgodamnyouHutchfuckmeplease—”

Driving in hard, possession, filling—muscular sheath contracting, tightening on him, demanding in return all the power he could deliver—hands going to the pulsing rigidity of Starsky’s erection, working, and Starsky bucking, screaming his name again and again, body convulsing in orgasm as Hutch reached his own climax in a last savage ramming thrust and then slumped across him, as helpless for the moment as the man bound under him.

Pulsebeats pounding, breathing harsh, neither moved for a while. Then Hutch reached up to fumble at the knots that held Starsky, letting his wrist slip loose, rolling to one side to pull the slack, exhausted body into his arms, holding him close, cradling the dark head against his shoulder. The storm spent, he wanted nothing more than to lie there, Starsky nestled to him in the hollow their bodies and pressed into the hay, floating in a mindless euphoria.

“…bastard…” a half-stifled mumble of querulous complaint. “…fuckin’ sadistic bastard…” And he burrowed closer with a small sigh.

“Thought you didn’t get off on bondage,” Hutch murmured into the soft curls, idly removing hay stalks. “Reckon they could measure that one on the Richter Scale.”

“Huh. Remind me to try it on you sometime,” Starsky growled, and one brilliant eye regarded Hutch with Machiavellian intent. “Yeah. Now that I could go for—handcuffin’ you to the bedrail—”

“You’d have to catch me first.” Hutch snorted. But the thought had an illicit excitement, all the same. It would depend on who got who hand cuffed to the bed. He was, after all, stronger than Starsky. “Lie still, can’t you?”

“Hay stalks. Prickly,” Starsky explained, but relaxed under the hand that stroked flank and thigh. “Mmmmm. You ever had it in the hay before?”

“I’m a Minnesota Farm Boy, remember? Yeah, sure. Better than the back seat of someone’s beat-up car any day. Guess we’d better get some clothes on. Don’t want to frighten the horses.”

“If we haven’t already, they’re unshockable,” Starsky said, stretching. And wincing. “Christ.”

“What?”

Starsky turned and looked at him. “Hutch. This has been a pretty interesting afternoon. I’m not really complainin’. But I wasn’t kiddin’ earlier when I said my ass was sore after that two-hour ride. Will you please tell me how the hell I’m gonna make the return-trip with my ass in the state it is now?”

Hutch grinned at him without any remorse.

“How about belly-down, Lover-Boy?” he drawled.