Ryker's Guide (Mild)

Dance Lessons

Daryl

Daryl was perched on Carbry's counter, precariously reaching for the vase that was at the very back corner of the upper most shelf in the kitchen and listening to Meriwa ramble about nearly everything. When she paused to take a breath, he grinned and glanced back at her as he pulled the vase into his hands and stepped backwards off the counter, landing easily on the floor. "You're rambling."

"Shut up. No I'm not." She scowled at him, grabbing the vase and turning to the sink. "And what if I am? How are you so cool? You have foursomes with your friends and their mates a lot?"

"You're probably the only person I would even think about doing this with." Daryl shrugged as he turned to cut the ends off the flowers using a pair of kitchen scissors he'd grabbed from the chopping block where all Carbry's fancy knives were stored, "And I made like six or seven cobblers today. Like, I was baking all day cause Ryker said I couldn't go to the farm cause I would get hurt or dirty or well...he didn't want me to leave him alone I don't think."

"King Vampire doesn't seem nervous." Meriwa rolled her eyes as she spoke, though she grinned a little when Daryl placed the flowers in the vase in front of her. Closing her eyes, she leaned forward and smelled them. "These are beautiful."

"I thought you'd like them. And I don't think it's super complicated for him." Daryl laughed softly, glancing at her and finding himself enjoying her smile. "As long as you're happy, he doesn't give a shit. Who does he need to impress? He pretty much rules the supernatural world already. What's a couple orgies going to do to his reputation?"

"I bet vampires get experience points for the number of orgies they have." Meri snorted, rolling her eyes again and using the detachable tap head to fill the vase with a bit more water. "I mean, aside from the fact that you're ridiculously hot and I'm sure I could sell your underwear for like thousands of dollars to anyone who'd met you, did you know that people actually buy shit like that? Anyway, aside from that...and even if you were ugly...or maybe if you were only as sorta attractive as Ryker might maybe be...I think you're the only person I'd try this with, too. You're not weird. We're friends."

"I mean, technically...is it necrophilia? That's what I'm more worried about..."

Meri's eyebrows shot up before she scowled and hosed him down with the spray nozzle. "Asshole. Now you'll have to eat shirtless."

"I can't eat shirtless." Daryl laughed, shaking his head and nodding toward the door. "You'll just have to watch me suffer with the wet shirt though the whole meal."

Meri paused, reaching out to smooth the sodden material over his body, making it cling to his muscles. Then she grinned and picked up the vase, turning and walking out into the dining room.

Dinner was amazing and the wine, thankfully, was good enough that it disappeared and Carbry opened up another two bottles of red from his own collection. The conversation, the company, was surprisingly easy, though Daryl didn't know what else he had expected. Ryker and Carbry had grown close after what had happened to Meri and once Ryker was distracted and his nerves were calm, it seemed like the most natural thing in the world. The four of them lapsing into easy and amicable conversation as if they'd simply always known each other.

"I don't know how to dance." Meri laughed as they cleared the table and Car moved to the sound system while talking about some era where there had been a lot of dancing. He was about to launch into one of his highly amusing yet ridiculously long stories when Ryker spoke up.

"Daryl is a good dancer." Ryker offered with a grin, turning to make his way toward Carbry's liquor cabinet, obviously on the hunt for something stronger than the wine. "Carbry and him could show you how to do it then probably teach you."

Meriwa was silent as Daryl followed her into the kitchen to deposit the dishes in the sink. She gave him a shy smile then a curious look as they stepped back out into the main living space. Daryl smirked as he watched Ryker line up four whiskey glasses and open a bottle of whiskey while Carbry was distracted with the records.

"Ok. Before I trust you two to give me lessons, show me what you've got." Mer said with finality, drawing Daryl to look at her and see her giving him a hopeful grin.

When he blushed and inclined his head, she turned to walk over to where Ryker was pouring out Carbry's precious alcohol, adding far more than he should into each of the glasses. Daryl observed the scene as Carbry turned to look at the two of them, and Daryl found himself grinning wider as the older vampire got an adorably charmed expression on his face while watching Ryker and Meri argue over how much whiskey to pour in. Both were wrong, though neither Daryl nor the older vampire had the heart to interrupt their back and forth interaction with the facts.

"Very well. We shall dance." Somehow, in the brief moment in time that Daryl had looked from Carbry to Ryker and Meri, the vampire had moved to his side, and he found himself pulled into a Waltz.

It took a couple moments for Daryl to fall into step while being led and trying to remember the moves that he had learned when he was younger, but when he stopped thinking about the dance itself, he began to think about the press of his body against the other man's. Carbry held him firmly, though his touch seemed feather light and his posture screamed formality. As the dance progressed, their movements grew bolder with dips and spins across a dining room that was suddenly bereft of furniture, probably a trick of the goddess' magic.

Daryl was humble on a good day, but he could honestly say he hadn't known he could dance like that. He didn't remember learning most of it, and some of the moves were sensual enough that he wouldn't have learned them in his high school dance courses. Somehow, perhaps merely because of who he was dancing with, he managed to not make an ass out of himself And when the music ended, leaving him pressed flush against Carbry and bent nearly completely to the ground, there was only silence.

Then the next song started and Carbry pulled him back up, leaving the two of them to turn and look towards Ryker and Meri. Who stood, stunned expressions on their faces, whiskey glasses forgotten in their hands.

"So..." Ryker swallowed, clearing his throat and taking a drink of his whiskey. "I thought the hottest dance I'd seen you perform was in a strip club." His voice was a deep growl of desire that had Daryl ducking his head and reaching up to rub the back of his neck.

Daryl opened his mouth to make a self-depreciatory joke when Carbry pulled him in close and kissed him roughly, cutting off his words then spinning him around and pushing him across the room to pin him to the wall before Daryl could even process what was happening. His hands slid over Carbry's chest, fingers working on unbuttoning the man's shirt as Carbry's mouth released his lips to trail down his jaw.

The vampire's hands ripped Daryl's shirt open, snapping the buttons off and sending them clattering across the floor as Daryl arched in his grasp as he turned to look at the other two. For all their careful conversations and insecurities, he found Ryker standing behind Meri, one hand pressed into her lower belly and holding her body tightly against his. Ryke's other hand laced into her hair as he kissed down her throat, their two sets of eyes fixated on the sight of Daryl and Carbry pinning him to the wall. Meri hand one hand reaching to hold the back of Ryker's head, her body arching up into him as her other hand gripped his hip, their bodies grinding together.

Daryl pushed back against Carbry, not that it moved the man at all, though it did succeed in grinding his body against the man's and further turning him on. Making a low noise of desire, Daryl let his hands roam as freely over Carbry's body as the man's mouth was roving over his own, eliciting growls of desire from the vampire who rewarded him with sharp, sensuous nips. The world shifted, and thanks to another trick of the goddess' magic, Daryl found himself on his back in Meri and Carbry's bed, the rest of the night dissolving in a haze of delicious desire.