For the Spring Kink Challenge prompt: Yami no Matsuei, Tatsumi/Hisoka: Preferential treatment (showing a soft side only to them) - "Tell me u don't want me to stop." Betaed by Eliza, who did her best to beat the regionalisms out of it.

It's not that Tatsumi's nice to him, precisely, though Tatsumi's always been courteous. That, he's certain, is the result of his own courtesy, and his work ethic; it hasn't changed. What has is the way Tatsumi holds his eyes when complimenting his teamwork with Tsuzuki, places a hand on his shoulder when speaking of the dangers of an assignment, asks if he'd like a refill of his tea when going to the breakroom. They're small things, but Tatsumi doesn't do them for anyone else, and that makes them loom large to Hisoka.

Others in the division notice. Hisoka can feel their speculation. Over half of them decide Tatsumi's bribing him to stay Tsuzuki's partner. Only Wakaba, Watari, and Tsuzuki himself guess at the real reason, and their various forms of excitement are headache-inducing.

It's that which makes Hisoka step into Tatsumi's office one afternoon and shut the door firmly. Tatsumi blinks up at him from over one of the ledgers, then straightens and beckons him forward.

"Is everything all right, Kurosaki-kun?"

By mutual, unspoken agreement, they've kept their arrangement out of the office. Except now Tatsumi's brought it in with his preferential treatment, and Hisoka's not quite sure how to address it.

He decides courtesy will serve him, as it always has with Tatsumi. "Tatsumi-san, forgive me, but I've found your behavior of late concerning."

"How--please sit down, Kurosaki-kun."

Hisoka takes a seat across the desk from Tatsumi, and immediately feels the muffling effect of Tatsumi's disciplined emotional state ease the pain behind his eyes. He lets out a small sigh, and Tatsumi frowns, setting his pen down.

"Are you well, Hisoka?"

That makes Hisoka frown, the tension creeping back. "You don't call me that at work, Tatsumi-san."

"I don't, or you'd rather I didn't?"

"I...never expected you'd want to," Hisoka admits, a little at a loss. Tatsumi leans forward, his eyes very blue under his desklamp.

"It would please me, Hisoka, but I'll only do so privately, if it makes you uncomfortable."

"And the rest of it?" Which is both abrupt and discourteous, but Hisoka's certain Tatsumi will forgive him. That's part of the problem, after all.

Tatsumi only looks at him for a moment, then pushes back from the desk and stands. Hisoka starts to rise as well, but Tatsumi holds up a hand. "No, don't get up. I just feel we should be...closer, for this conversation."

Hisoka waits warily, and he can't help closing his eyes as Tatsumi passes behind him toward the seat on his other side, thinking of night and shadows and the solidity of Tatsumi at his back in a bed not his own. Tatsumi turns the other chair to face him, and sits down. If Hisoka were to turn, he thinks their knees would touch. He turns only his head.

"I apologize if I've overstepped any boundaries by treating you differently at the office, Hisoka," Tatsumi says, his voice low and intimate, incongruent in his daylit office. "However, I wonder if you might consider allowing me to continue."

Hisoka blinks, thrown despite Tatsumi's behavior thus far. "What?"

"I don't want to stop." Tatsumi leans forward once more, until there's less than a finger's width of space between his mouth and Hisoka's, but he doesn't touch. "Do you want me to stop?"

Hisoka swallows, and Tatsumi's disciplined, but Hisoka can still feel his desire when they're this close. It always draws out his own. He swallows again, manages to whisper, "Why don't you want to stop?"

Tatsumi smiles. "I like to know I can be like this, and I like the way you respond to me after I've been like this."

Hisoka draws breath to ask what he means, but thinks better of it. He knows; because Tatsumi doesn't do it to anyone else, he finds it flattering. That makes him wonder. "What if I were to treat you like that too, Seiichirou?"

Now Tatsumi touches, one hand on Hisoka's thigh just before Hisoka kisses him. "Then I would respond."

~END~