Escapology
“The game,” Damien murmured against Lysander’s ear, “is simple. Are you paying attention? I’ll only say it once.”
Lysander twisted his head on the plush mattress, trying to get a good look at the other man behind him. He couldn’t. Damon’s grip was firm on Lysander’s wrists, and the weight of him kept Lysander easily pinned down to the bed. Lysander did his best to pretend he didn’t enjoy that as much as he did.
“I’m going to set the timer for one minute,” Damien said. “And, every time you fail to escape within those sixty seconds, I’m going to make the task more difficult for you.”
“I’m not going to fail,” Lysander said. “Do you seriously still think I don’t know how to get out of a pair of handcuffs?”
“We’ll find out, won’t we?” Damien’s voice was perfectly placid by contrast. “Remember, if you want out, all you have to do is say please.”
“Yeah? How about, ‘screw you?’
“Bit early in the night for that. Maybe I’ll let you if you win.”
“There’s no if!”
Lysander had been working with some variety of lock for almost as long as he’d had proper motor control in his fingers. He’d always had a weakness for locked things, for secrets, and for the physical and mental puzzle of untangling himself out of any situation he’d found himself in. He knew how to get out of something as simple as a pair of handcuffs! And if he did, perhaps, enjoy being restrained it was an enjoyment made greater by the inability to free himself.
He could always free himself.
Maybe, if he couldn’t, he wouldn’t have ended up in this room. With him.
The conversation, in short:
INT: BAR OUTSIDE OF LYSANDER’S SHOW - EVENING
Enter LYSANDER, daring and brilliant young escape artist, who crosses the room through a flurry of impressed fans and people begging to know just how he does it. He comes across a dashingly handsome man in the process of ordering a drink. This is DAMIEN. They look each other up and down, and strike a conversation. It escalates.
LYSANDER
You didn’t enjoy my show?
DAMIEN
Oh, I enjoyed it. But escape artistry is just a con - you always have a hidden way out. A trick.
LYSANDER
You think it’s a trick? I’d like to see you try and hold me!
DAMIEN
Alright.
LYSANDER
Excuse me?
DAMIEN
I said alright.
LYSANDER
You think you would be able to keep me, a professional escape artist, from escaping you? What, do you tie people up for a living or something?
DAMIEN
Yes.
Lysander stares at him.
DAMIEN
I work at Siren, down the road. The BDSM club. I’m a professional rigger.
Lysander continues to stare at him.
DAMIEN
Have I scared you?
LYSANDER
…So when should I come over?
“Do you have any more questions before we start?” Damien asked.
“You could at least cuff my feet for round one. This is just insulting.”
“That wasn’t a question. Do you have any questions?” Damien asked again, this time with an unmistakable amusement.
Lysander shook his head.
Damien pulled back from him and Lysander rolled onto his back. He propped himself up on his elbows and watched as Damien reached over and started the timer on his phone. He let the small silver key drop down on the bed.
“Are you not even going to try and hold onto it?”
“55 seconds left…”
Lysander lunged for the key. His hands were behind his back, but he snatched it off the sheets with his mouth and spat it back over his shoulder, only slightly showing off when he caught it deftly. He scraped the silver up against the lock in search of the small hole that would spring him free.
The cuffs clicked loose and he looked up towards Damien with a smirk, somewhere between cocky and disappointed all at once.
“I told you,” he said. “Honestly, after all your talk I thought you might last at least thirty seconds. They pay you for this?”
Damien hummed, not even watching. He was digging something out of his closet.
“You wouldn’t even have got them on in the first place if I didn’t let you,” Lysander added.
“Yes, yes, you’re very impressive. You did miss one detail though...”
Damien turned to face him, and his smirk back was that of a challenge matched.
Lysander’s spine straightened instinctively; a thrill shooting up him, though his brow furrowed with confusion.
“I said,” Damien set a bag down on the bed. “Escape.” He pounced, and Lysander went down again hard with a yelp and a tangle of limbs. He grappled with Damien’s hands, but was shoved down again, relentlessly. His wrists were yanked behind his back and the lock clicked into place. “I didn’t say, ‘get out of the cuffs,’ did I?”
Oh.
Lysander panted for breath, absorbing that new information in with interest. He tried to hold back a grin.
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a bastard?”
“Usually around the same time they’re begging me for more.”
He still sounded so calm, so implacable. It made Lysander want to wind him up and up and up until he lost it; another puzzle to undo.
“So how am I supposed to win, then?” Lysander asked, musing. “Get off the bed? Get out of the room?”
“Now you’re getting it.” Damien’s hands were busy wrapping a thick belt around Lysander’s arms, clinching them together at the elbow. “Except, of course, for one small thing.” He stepped back, and re-set the timer, eyes full of a dark heady promise. “You’re not going to win.”
***
The alarm sounded.
Lysander was not winning.
Damien had bound his ankles after he lost round two, then his knees after round three. After a round four, he attached Lysander’s wrist cuffs to his ankles and left him in a hogtie.
Lysander had just lost round five.
He curled his fist around the key, not about to give it up without a fight. He didn’t have to. The only thing he’d been tasked to do was escape, not obey, or behave by any means. He scrambled back, keeping his gaze locked on Damien, his mind racing through his albeit limited options. Every time he’d managed to get himself free in time so far, he hadn’t managed to get past Damien.
Damien, who sauntered closer now with the sort of lethal grace more commonly seen in jungle cats.
Lysander swallowed.
“You’re looking tired,” Damien said. “Want to give up?”
“I want to point out that I’ve undone all of your ties.”
“And yet here you are, still helpless on my bed.”
Lysander swallowed a second time, but it didn’t make his mouth any less dry, especially when Damien went and said things like that. His back hit the headboard.
“I’m not helpless.”
“Not yet. We’ll get there, don’t worry.”
“I’m not – I don’t –” Lysander floundered. He didn’t know how to finish without lying and lying was not allowed for safety reasons.
Damien paused at the other end of the bed, considering him in turn.
Lysander realised after a beat that he was waiting for the end of the sentence. He exhaled, and squared his shoulders.
“Well,” he said instead. “I’m not going to just give you the key.”
“Of course not.” Damien said. He had that amusement in his voice again. He grabbed Lysander by the ankle cuffs and yanked him bodily down the bed. “Come here, then.”
It felt like Lysander should say ‘I don’t want to be helpless,’ but that wasn’t strictly true. He just didn’t want to let Damien do it. It was one thing during his shows when the various ties were complex spectacles, when he had to be conscious of nerve damage and height and a dozen different variables all at once. Damien wasn’t picking anything complicated that would be a particular mess to get out of. Perhaps that was the point.
Lysander kicked, all but throwing himself off the bed.
Damien reeled him back, working the key free from Lysander’s grip, before wrapping an arm around him.
“I’ll let you pick your forfeit,” Damien said, softly. “Would you like to be blindfolded, or would you prefer to be gagged?”
Neither concept was exactly new to him. None of this was exactly new to him, and yet it was different. He hadn’t expected how intimate it would feel, or the way that he couldn’t find the steady calm he usually found when he was working methodically free for practice. What he normally did was rote. It was him against something inanimate. Knots could be tricky but they were predictable.
It was impossible to think of Damien as something inanimate. Lysander’s heart raced, and he felt hyper-aware of his every movement, and the warmth of Damien’s hands and the scent of his cologne on the air. It was a little intoxicating.
For the first time, Lysander considered the possibility that he might actually lose this bet.
(He was fine with that.)
***
Lysander couldn’t see, couldn’t speak, and couldn’t move an inch. He was, well and truly, stuck.
Christ he couldn’t remember the last time that happened.
His chest rose and fell rapidly as he caught his breath, his muscles trembling with a peaceful sort of exhaustion. He couldn’t possibly get out of this anymore, could no longer fight, so it was okay to settle. His defiance had splintered. In the dark, he was a creature of sensation alone, world narrowed down, no audience to think of. It was overwhelming and…nice.
He didn’t think he’d get this feeling again.
Damien carded his fingers idly through Lysander’s hair, laying on the bed beside him. He seemed to be taking a moment to catch his breath too.
“Alright?” he asked.
Lysander made a sound of agreement.
Damien’s nail trailed down, curving along the edge of Lysander’s jaw, tipping his head up a fraction.
“I suppose,” he said, “that you are not a total con artist.”
Lysander huffed. He supposed he could say the same about Damien not being completely arrogant coming up to an escape artist and telling him he’d clearly never been properly tied up before.
“Ready to come out?”
Lysander was back the following week.
They both agreed it was simply excellent practice after all.
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