He Makes Me (Queen AU)

Chapter 58

The brunette grabbed the corset and wrapped it around himself, holding it against his chest and facing away from the blonde. Having been in the same place not too long ago, the latter knew what was expected of him and stepped forward, grabbing the loose lace and weaving it through the holes of the garment.

"It was the day I saw you two in the library," Tim revealed, staring at his reflection again—now joined by Roger's. He wished his baby blues were staring back, but the blonde's gaze was focused on his back. He did, however, notice the distressed crinkle that formed on his forehead as he heard what he'd said. The corner of his lip twitched. "It drove me absolutely mad, the thought of you guys together, so I tried all sorts of things to get the image out of my head." He tucked his chin into his chest and began to play with one of the loose sequins hanging onto the corset by a thread. "Nothing worked. The pills and alcohol just upset my stomach, and the rope around my neck was too loose. The blades I used were too dull, and Neil found me in the tub before I could drown. The fucker was holding onto my hair and looking at me with these worried eyes when I realized I was doing it all wrong. It wasn't myself I should be punishing. It was him. It was you." The brunette glanced up to see that he'd finally gained the blonde's attention, his darkened eyes peering over his shoulder. "And now it's her."

The drummer bit his lip and glanced back down at his hands, tugging the lace through the last two hoops at the top of the corset and knotting them together. "I'm sorry you felt that way."

"You wish you felt sorry," Tim grumbled. "But you don't, and you aren't." He spun around so abruptly that Roger staggered back, falling against the tub's edge and taking an involuntary seat on it. "You knew exactly what you were doing, Roger, and if I hadn't brought you two here, you would've kept doing it."

"Look, Tim, I didn't mean to use you," the blonde muttered, a guilty and apologetic undertone to his confession. His accusation reminded him of Brian's. You knew he liked you, and you liked that he liked you because you knew he'd do anything for you.

The brunette laughed. "You think that's what I'm upset about?" He clasped his hands behind his back and shortened the distance between them with slow, calculated steps. "I liked that you used me, Rog, coming to me for things you wouldn't go to Brian for. It really was quite flattering, but no. What I'm talking about—" he nestled himself in between the blonde's parted legs and ran his hands up the drummer's thighs, "—is you acting like you didn't like me back." He leaned in, pressing their waists together.

The unwelcomed but arousing pressure sent Roger's heart into overdrive, and before either of them could realize it, he was slipping out of Tim's hands like butter, landing directly on his tailbone and hitting his head against the side of the tub, hard.

Roger groaned and squeezed his eyes shut, grabbing for the back of his skull that throbbed in pain.

When he opened his eyes, he noticed Tim standing over him, mesmerized by his body that lay awkwardly in the empty basin—his spine curled against the porcelain bottom, his legs dangling over the ledge, and his chest straining against the corset with each labored breath he drew in anticipation of his captor's next move.

Suddenly but slowly, the brunette knelt down, folding his arms between the blonde's knees and resting his chin atop his wrist. His eyes drifted from Roger's face to his leg, where his fingers grazed the stockings stretched over them.

"I know you like me," he insisted, his focus locked on his hand and the indent in the blonde's knee his finger lightly traced. "You wouldn't still be here if you didn't."

Roger scoffed, dropping the hand supporting his head to his lap and reminding him cynically, "Tim, you literally killed your friend for trying to leave."

"Who said I wouldn't have spared you?"

"You! You threatened to do the same thing to me if I didn't do as you said!" the blonde cried, attempting to sit up but instantly being pulled back down. A painful grunt seeped through his clenched teeth.

"I wasn't going to kill you, Roger," Tim assured him, chuckling under his breath at his captive's untrusting gaze. "I just—" His voice cut off, and after a long, punctuated pause, his gaze made its way to the baby blues he saw in the mirror not too long ago—darker than normal, sinister almost. He could only imagine that that was his doing. It surely wasn't intentional, but neither was any of this.

He swallowed hard, his Adam's apple moving up and down noticeably in his throat. He needn't speak another word for Roger to know what he was implying; to know that all of this—from the kidnapping to the grooming to the empty threats—was just his way of expressing something he couldn't express in words. Had he done it differently, there was no doubt in Roger's mind that they wouldn't be in this situation. But they were, and the only way out was to play the game.

So, with a heavy sigh, he buried his face in his hands and said behind palms that muffled his voice, "For fuck's sake." He dragged his fingers down his cheeks and dropped them into his lap, meeting his captor's apprehensive gaze. "Tim, look. I'd be lying if I said I didn't like you, or if I said you were a bad shag, but—" he threw a freshly bandaged hand at the ceiling, "—you've got to understand that our friends are about to die up there, and the second we go up there, we're going to die."

"What, you don't trust Brian to protect you?" the brunette sneered, rising to his feet and folding his arms over his half-covered chest.

"Of course I don't fucking trust him to protect me," Roger grumbled, mirroring his captor's stance from his uncomfortable position in the tub. "He couldn't even—"

Just then, a gunshot echoed through the house, silencing both boys instantly. They tipped their heads back, looking around the ceiling to see if they could pinpoint the sound's origin. It wouldn't mean much to Roger if he did. He had no idea where the stage—or wherever the bullet had been fired—was in relation to the bathroom in the basement. Tim did, though.