Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The studio was mostly empty. Just haze in the air, the kind of silence that clung to things—wires, walls, worn-out voices.

It was past two in the morning, and the others had gone home hours ago. But Ray was still at the keys, and Jim… Jim never left when he was supposed to.

He was draped across the floor like he owned it. Boots kicked off, one hand behind his head, a cigarette burned down between his fingers.

“I think the bridge needs something else,” Ray said quietly, not looking at him.

Jim didn't answer right away. He just hummed—low, smoky, something that slid under Ray’s skin like a wire being threaded through his ribs.

“You’re thinking too much,” Jim finally said.

Ray’s hands froze above the keyboard.

“That’s rich, coming from you.”

A crooked smile.

“I don’t think. I feel.”

Ray turned just slightly, enough to catch the way Jim was watching him. Eyes dark. Pupils blown a little too wide for the low light. He smelled different.

Not bad. Not strong. Just… warmer. Sharper. Something new folded into the smoke and sweat and hotel soap.

Ray’s jaw tightened. He looked back down at the keys.

“Go home,” he said, voice steady.

“You’ve been here too long.”

Jim stretched, arms overhead, the hem of his shirt sliding up.

“I could say the same about you, alpha.” Ray stilled.

The word dropped like a match into gasoline.

“I’m not—” “You are,” Jim said softly. Not mocking. Not playful. Just… stating a fact.

Ray’s fingers flexed against the keys. His heart beat slow and hard in his chest.

“You’re close, aren’t you?” he asked, finally.

“You’re starting.”

Jim didn’t answer. Didn’t need to. Ray could feel it—like heat curling around the edges of his control. Jim’s scent was pulling at instincts he kept locked up behind years of discipline, professionalism, friendship. He heard Jim shift, the soft rustle of fabric.

“I’m not gonna bond with you,” Jim murmured.

“Not looking for that.”

Ray’s head turned. His voice was quiet.

“I didn’t offer.”

Another slow grin from the floor.

“Didn’t say I wanted it. Just saying I wouldn’t stop you.”

Ray stood up fast. Too fast. The stool scraped across the floor. Jim didn’t flinch. Just lay there, lazy and dangerous, like a lit fuse waiting for the wrong breath.

“You should leave,”

Ray said again, rougher this time. Jim exhaled smoke toward the ceiling.

“Why? You afraid of what you’ll do?”

Ray’s hands curled into fists.

“I’m afraid of what we might do.”

It was summer.
Sticky, slow, and shimmering with heat that made everything feel a little unreal.

They weren’t a band yet. Just two guys in the UCLA film library, pretending to care about existentialism and Godard, when all they really wanted was to be heard. To make something. To matter.

Jim had shown up barefoot, as always, sunglasses hiding a hangover. He sat too close and talked too low, and Ray—Ray had already noticed the way people watched him.

But that day?

It was different.

Jim was quieter than usual. His shirt stuck to his chest. His pupils were dilated, and his laugh came late, like it had to push through something thick and invisible to reach the surface.

Ray caught the scent before he understood what it was.

Not cologne. Not sweat.
Something sweet and sharp, like citrus and rain and sin.

He blinked.

Jim was reading something—something about Dionysus and madness and divine surrender—and Ray couldn’t focus on a single word.

“Hey,” he said, voice caught between a question and a warning. “You okay?”

Jim looked up. Smiled.

It was the kind of smile that made people stupid.

“I’m fine,” he said. “Just... hot.”

Ray swallowed.

And then Jim leaned forward—slow, unthinking—and the scent hit harder. Thick. Feral. The kind that made Ray’s spine go tight and his stomach twist low and possessive.

Omega.

The word hit him like a secret he wasn’t supposed to know.

Ray looked away. Gritted his teeth.

“Do you need… anything?” he asked, carefully.

Jim blinked at him behind the shades, like he wasn’t used to anyone asking.

“No one’s asked me that before,” he said, voice softer than usual. “Not when it mattered.”

Ray didn’t say anything.

Didn’t reach out. Didn’t touch.

But that scent?
It followed him home.
Got caught in his sheets.
Haunted his dreams.

Later, when the band came together, when the world started to pay attention—Ray never brought it up again.

But he remembered.

And when Jim pressed a little too close, leaned a little too long, laughed into his shoulder on stage—Ray always knew how close they were to something that could burn them both alive.

The next gig was a backroom show—packed, loud, bodies pressed close with no room to breathe. The kind of place where people came to lose themselves in the dark.

Ray was already tense when they got there.

Jim had shown up late, wild-eyed, the smell of heat clinging to his skin like smoke.

No suppressant. No shame. Just open, like he wanted the whole damn room to know.

“You’re making it worse,” Ray muttered backstage, cornering him for half a second. “You need to dial it down.”

Jim tilted his head, pupils wide, a bead of sweat rolling down his throat.

“Can’t help how I smell, Ray,” he murmured, voice thick and lazy. “You know that.”

Ray’s hands curled into fists.

“Then stay close.”

Jim blinked. “Why?”

Ray didn’t answer.

He couldn’t.

The set was chaos.
Jim moved like he was possessed, voice raw, hands gripping the mic like it was the only thing keeping him tethered.

And every time someone reached for him—fans, techs, strangers trying to flirt—Ray felt it.

Like a knife to the gut.

He watched one guy brush against Jim’s hip during “Back Door Man,” lingering too long, eyes hungry.

And something in Ray snapped.

After the show, he grabbed Jim by the arm, dragged him into a side hallway lined with amp cords and half-empty beer bottles.

“What the hell was that?” he hissed.

Jim didn’t pull away. Just grinned. “A performance?”

Ray leaned in, voice low. Dangerous. “I mean him touching you.”

“Jealous, Ray?” Jim whispered, breath warm against his cheek. “Didn’t think you cared who touched me.”

Ray backed him against the wall, eyes dark.

“I don’t. But I’m not letting some drunk beta lay hands on you in front of a crowd.”

Jim’s breath hitched.

“Then who gets to?”

Silence.

Ray stared at him, something primal clawing up his throat. Every breath he took was thick with Jim—heat-slick, sweet and sharp, like temptation wrapped in gasoline.

He didn’t kiss him.

Didn’t touch.

But his voice was rough when he finally said, “No one. Not unless I say so.”

Jim’s eyes went wide.

And Ray walked away before he did something he couldn’t undo.

Chapter Text

It was supposed to be rehearsal.

The studio was dim, just enough light to see the cords coiled like snakes across the floor. John was late. Robby was nursing a hangover. But Ray was already at the organ, adjusting levels with surgical precision.

Jim was pacing.

Wound up. Wired.

His scent had gone from subtle to suffocating—something syrupy and ripe curling in the air, laced with sweat and skin and invitation.

He wasn’t even trying to hide it anymore.

“You need to sit down,” Ray said without looking up.

Jim laughed, low and feral. “Why? Afraid I’ll distract you?”

Ray’s jaw flexed.

He hit a chord—sharp, dissonant.

Jim flinched.

Ray stood, slow, turning.

Jim was too close. Close enough Ray could see the flushed skin at his throat, the sheen of heat making his curls stick to his neck.

“You’re not thinking clearly,” Ray said, voice rough.

“I never do,” Jim shot back, eyes gleaming. “Isn’t that why you like me?”

Ray stepped forward, just enough that Jim had to tilt his head back.

The tension was crackling now—alive. The air felt thick, like it had teeth.

“You’re going to push me too far,” Ray said.

Jim smiled like a dare.

“Maybe that’s what I want.”

And that was it.
________________________________________
Ray moved fast—faster than he meant to.

Hands gripping Jim’s shoulders, slamming him back against the studio wall with a thud that shook the mic stand.

Jim gasped—but didn’t pull away. His pupils were blown wide.

His hands fisted in Ray’s shirt.

He was panting.

“I told you,” Ray growled, nose inches from his, “not to pull this shit in here.”

Jim licked his lips. “And if I do it anyway?”

Ray’s hand shot to Jim’s jaw, fingers pressing hard, holding him in place.

His body was screaming—instincts flooding him with heat, need, claim—but he fought it, teeth grit, chest heaving.

Jim arched just slightly into the pressure.

Ray cursed under his breath.

“You want me to lose control?”

Jim’s voice was barely a whisper. “Yes.”
________________________________________
Ray released him like he’d been burned.

Stepped back, fists clenched at his sides.

“You don’t know what you’re asking for.”

“I do,” Jim said, eyes wild. “I want to be ruined, Ray.”

Ray stared at him for a long, shaking moment.

Then turned away.

“If I touch you right now,” he said, voice like gravel, “I won’t stop.”

Jim didn’t answer.

Didn’t need to.

The silence said it all.

The hotel room door slammed shut behind them.

Ray hadn’t planned it—hell, he hadn’t even decided it—but the second Jim brushed past him in the hallway, scent high and clinging, practically dripping with need, everything inside Ray went hot and sharp.

And then Jim said it.

“I’m tired of pretending.”

That was all it took.

Ray had him pinned against the door before the words even landed.
________________________________________
Mouths crashed together—hungry, unpracticed, all tongue and teeth.

Jim moaned, sharp and breathless, wrapping one leg around Ray’s hip like he needed more, closer, deeper.

“You waited too long,” he gasped.

Ray growled against his throat. “You drove me insane.”

Jim’s shirt tore somewhere between the wall and the bed.

Ray didn’t care.

He kissed down Jim’s chest like he was starving—fingers digging into his hips, dragging slick-slick-slick skin under his hands, breathing in heat and salt and the dizzying scent of an omega finally ready to be claimed.
________________________________________
“I wanted you to lose control,” Jim whispered, dazed, on his back now, curls sticking to sweat-damp skin.

Ray hovered over him, eyes dark, body shaking with restraint he didn’t want anymore.

“You’re not going to walk out of this the same,” he said low.

Jim grinned—wild, broken-open. “That’s the fucking point.”
________________________________________
Ray sank into him in one deep, claiming thrust—and the world exploded.

Jim cried out, nails raking Ray’s back, legs locked tight around his waist.

And Ray—Ray felt it in his bones, the snap of every boundary he’d built crumbling to ash.

They moved together like a storm.

Hard, fast, endless.

Ray couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t stop. Not when Jim was gasping his name like a man possessed.

Not when their scents were tangling in the air like smoke and lightning.

Not when the knot was coming—and Jim was begging for it.
________________________________________
“Do it,” he moaned, body trembling. “Mark me—please.”

Ray bit hard.

Right at the curve of his neck.

Jim screamed—and came undone.
________________________________________
Afterward, they lay tangled together.

Breathing hard. Sticky. Shaking.

Ray pressed his forehead to Jim’s.

“You’re mine now,” he whispered.

Jim smiled, dazed, eyes fluttering shut. “Took you long enough.”

Chapter Text

The hotel room was quiet.
Sunlight filtered through the broken blinds, painting sharp lines across the sheets—across skin. Across the bond mark.
Ray blinked awake slowly.
His body ached.
His scent clung to everything—saturated in the mattress, in the tangled sheets, in Jim.
That alone was enough to make Ray’s breath hitch.
Jim was still asleep.
One arm draped over Ray’s chest, curls a mess, lips parted in a way that looked obscene even in sleep. His scent had softened—still sweet, still warm, but bonded.
Ray should’ve felt guilty.
Instead, he felt high.
Possessive. Anchored. Dangerously calm.
He slid a hand through Jim’s hair, slow, careful.
The bond thrummed at the contact—alive and electric, real.
Jim stirred.
Eyes opened, slow and hazy.
“Morning,” he said, voice wrecked.
Ray swallowed. “You okay?”
Jim’s lips curled. “After being ruined by you all night? Never better.”
Ray’s breath caught.
It would’ve been easier if Jim had regretted it. If he’d rolled away, cracked a joke, denied everything.
But instead—he melted into Ray, brushing their noses together like it was normal. Like this was always going to happen.
“You’re mine now,” Ray said quietly.
Jim blinked. Then grinned. “Finally figured that out, huh?”
Ray didn’t smile.
He was still too full of something sharp.
“Does it hurt?” he asked, brushing his thumb over the bond mark.
Jim shivered.
“Yeah,” he whispered. “But it’s a good kind of hurt.”
________________________________________
Later, Jim wandered the room half-naked, humming to himself, skin still marked up—bitten, bruised, loved raw.
Ray watched from the bed, jaw tight.
He didn’t say it out loud, but every time Jim turned away, Ray’s body screamed to pull him back.
The bond wasn’t just a mark. It was a claim.
And now Ray felt everything—every shift in Jim’s scent, every flicker of thought under the surface, every want.
It was overwhelming. Addictive.
He couldn’t stop looking at him.
________________________________________
“We’re gonna have to talk about it,” Jim said casually, lighting a cigarette near the window.
Ray raised an eyebrow. “Talk about what?”
“The fact that you went from saint to sinner in like, ten seconds. You gonna be like this every time I get looked at funny?”
“Yes.”
Jim laughed. “Shit.”
But there was no fear in his voice. No regret.
Only satisfaction.
Ray got up. Crossed the room. Took the cigarette from Jim’s mouth and crushed it out.
Then pressed him against the window, slow and unhurried.
“Next time,” Ray murmured, mouth against Jim’s ear, “you won’t have the strength to walk the next morning.”
Jim tilted his head back, breath hitching.
“Promises, promises.”
_______________________________________________

Three nights into the East Coast run, and Ray was already one wrong look away from throwing someone off a balcony.
The crowds were bigger. Wilder.
Jim was riding the bond-high like a wave, slinking across the stage like he knew he was owned—and loved knowing everyone else had to watch from a distance.
But that didn’t stop them from looking.
Didn’t stop the way people screamed his name, reached for his skin, threw their numbers on stage like prayers at the altar of a god who would never answer.
Ray played through clenched teeth.
The bond pulsed every time someone touched Jim.
Even if it was just a hand on his shoulder—Ray felt it.
He couldn’t stop tracking him.
________________________________________
In Boston, it almost exploded.
Some radio guy backstage—tall, alpha, too confident—tried to corner Jim after the set. Offered a drink. Smiled too wide.
Jim didn’t even get a chance to answer.
Ray was there in seconds.
He didn’t say a word.
Just stepped between them, towering, shoulders squared, hand braced on the wall beside Jim like he was casually blocking off an exit.
The guy blinked. Tried to laugh it off.
Ray didn’t laugh.
“Not interested,” he said flatly, voice like a warning bell underwater.
The guy backed off. Fast.
Jim bit his lip the whole time. “You didn’t have to scare him.”
Ray turned, nostrils flared. “You’re mine. He could smell it.”
“Yeah,” Jim said softly, leaning in. “So can everyone else. That’s why it’s fun.”
Ray didn’t kiss him.
Didn’t growl.
Just dragged him by the wrist into the dressing room and locked the door.
________________________________________
They didn’t make it to the bed.
Ray took him against the wall, hand over his mouth, fingers bruising hips already too sore from the last hotel. Jim came twice, wrecked and whispering Ray’s name like prayer through clenched teeth.
After, Ray held him there—trembling, knotted, marked again—and whispered in his ear:
“Keep teasing me like that, and I’ll keep fucking you like this. In every city. Every night.”
Jim’s answer was breathless and immediate.
“Good.”
________________________________________
The next night, Jim wore one of Ray’s shirts onstage.
Unbuttoned. Bond mark proud and visible.
And Ray?
He played like the piano owed him a life.
Chapter 7: Teeth Behind the Smile
It was New York.
A rooftop afterparty, overpriced wine, golden city lights dripping across the skyline. Someone had booked the whole floor for the band. Photographers. Press. Models. All circling like sharks.
Jim was in Ray’s shirt again—half-buttoned, skin flushed, bond mark just visible under his collarbone.
And he was holding court.
Ray stood by the bar, a glass untouched in his hand, trying not to crush the stem every time someone leaned too close to Jim. His scent was spiking. His control fraying.
Then it happened.
Some actor—clean-cut, smug, beta—slipped between Jim and the crowd, laughing too loud, saying all the right things.
And he kissed Jim’s hand.
Slow. Deliberate. Right over the bond mark.
The world stopped.
Ray didn’t even think.
He was moving before the guy stood back up.
________________________________________
The glass in Ray’s hand shattered.
People turned.
Then froze.
Ray was in front of the guy in two heartbeats, taller, shoulders set like steel. The bond surged under his skin, a white-hot pulse behind his eyes.
“Touch him again,” Ray said low, calm in a way that made people back up, “and I will make sure you never lift that hand again.”
The actor blinked, confused. “Hey, man, it’s just a party—”
Ray stepped in.
“No. It’s mine. And you just put your lips on it.”
________________________________________
Jim slid between them before it got bloody, hands on Ray’s chest, scent curling sweet and sharp—calming him, barely.
“Ray,” he whispered, voice low, intimate. “Let it go.”
Ray didn’t take his eyes off the guy.
But he did wrap an arm around Jim’s waist. Pulling him close, flush against his side.
“Not here,” Jim added, fingertips ghosting down Ray’s arm. “Later. You can… remind me.”
Ray’s breath hitched.
Jim leaned in, lips brushing Ray’s ear.
“Claim me again. Make them all hear it.”
________________________________________
Ten minutes later, they were in a bathroom stall.
Jim on his knees.
Ray’s hands in his hair, head thrown back, growling every time Jim moaned around him.
And when it was over—
—Ray bit down harder on the bond mark, new blood beading against teeth.
Jim gasped like he’d been reborn.

They came out looking wrecked.
Jim’s shirt misbuttoned.
Ray’s belt undone.
The bond mark fresh and red on display.
No one touched Jim again.
_________________________________________
The venue was packed. Wall-to-wall bodies. Lights like fire, heat like a furnace. The kind of energy that vibrated through skin and bone.
And Jim?
Jim was untouchable.
Hair wild, skin gleaming, shirt clinging to every sharp, perfect line of him. His voice wrapped around the crowd like silk and smoke, and his scent—
His scent was devastating.
________________________________________
Ray barely made it through the first two songs.
His hands were stiff on the keys, mind burning from the bond-pull, from the need, from the way Jim kept looking back at him while singing—eyes low-lidded, mouth wet, tongue flicking over his bottom lip like a fucking promise.
By the third song, Jim was crouching on the edge of the stage, mic between his teeth, moaning into it like he was in heat already—which, he wasn’t, not yet. But his scent was close enough.
“This next one,” he purred into the mic, breathy and low, “goes out to someone who’s been... holding back.”
The crowd screamed.
Ray saw red.
________________________________________
Jim turned his back on the audience, sauntered over mid-song, right up to Ray.
Still singing.
Still looking at him like he was the only goddamn thing in the universe.
And then Jim—
That beautiful, reckless bastard—
—straddled Ray’s bench.
Mid-set. Mid-note.
Sank down into his lap like he belonged there.
________________________________________
Ray’s hands stopped playing.
The crowd went wild.
Ray didn’t care.
He gripped Jim’s hips. Hard. Growled right against his throat.
“What the fuck are you doing.”
Jim just grinned. “Making you lose control.”
Ray’s control shattered.
________________________________________
He kissed him.
On stage.
Hard. Open. Claiming.
The mic caught it. Amplified the wet gasp Jim made when Ray pulled him closer, grinding him down hard enough that the friction alone made Jim moan.
The lights didn’t matter.
The crowd didn’t matter.
Just the bond. Just Jim.
Just Ray owning him where everyone could see.
________________________________________
Jim broke the kiss, panting into the mic, voice blown and fucked.
“Told you he’d break.”
The venue erupted.
Ray just dragged him off the bench, held him against the wall of amps, mouth pressed to his neck, breathing him in like oxygen.
________________________________________
They finished the set like that.
Ray playing half one-handed, the other still gripping Jim’s thigh.
Jim didn’t leave his lap.
Didn’t stop touching him once.
________________________________________
Backstage, no one said a word.
They didn’t have to.
Jim’s scent was everywhere.
Ray’s mouth was bruised.
And the bond?
Still humming. Still burning.
________________________________________
The headlines hit fast.
“The Doors’ On-Stage Makeout Shocks Crowd!”
“Lead Singer’s Public Bonding Stuns Industry.”
“Alpha Pianist Breaks Silence in Explosive Display.”
Photos exploded across every paper, magazine, and late-night segment.
Jim, on Ray’s lap.
Ray’s hand digging into Jim’s thigh.
The kiss.
The way Jim moaned into the mic.
The fresh bond mark glowing red under stage lights.
________________________________________
Management called it a “momentary lapse.”
They wanted damage control. Press statements. Apologies.
Ray didn’t even read the draft they sent him.
He sat on the hotel balcony, cigarette burning low between his fingers, Jim’s scent still all over him, and stared down at the city below like it was beneath him.
Inside, Jim was half-naked, stretched across Ray’s bed, flipping through press clippings with a grin so smug it made Ray’s mouth go dry.
“You’re trending,” Jim said, voice sing-song. “They’re calling you possessive.”
Ray looked at him, slow and dangerous.
“I am.”
Jim laughed. Rolled over. Showed his throat like a dare.
“I know.”
________________________________________
The band was split.
Robby said it was inevitable.
John didn’t want to talk about it.
Everyone else just kept their distance—like Ray might start something again at any second.
Which he might.
________________________________________
Backstage the next night, a journalist tried to push a mic in Jim’s face.
“Any comments about the bond—?”
Ray stepped in.
Didn’t shove. Didn’t speak.
Just looked.
And the guy backed the hell off.
Jim slid an arm around Ray’s waist after. Didn’t even try to hide it.
“Think they get it now?” he murmured.
Ray leaned down, lips brushing his ear.
“They will.”
________________________________________
That night’s show was worse.
Not sloppier. Not quieter.
Worse—because the tension was electric. Because Jim leaned into it. Because Ray didn’t stop him.
Because every moan into the mic, every lyric about need and hunger, made the crowd lose their minds—and Ray?
He played like he was fucking him in every note.
After, Jim stumbled offstage, breathless, legs shaking.
Ray caught him. Lifted him. Didn’t let go.
They didn’t even make it to the dressing room.
Just a dark hallway, a locked door, and Jim against the wall, crying out into Ray’s mouth like he wanted the world to hear it again.
________________________________________
And the press?
They ate it up.
It started before soundcheck.
Jim was quiet.
Too quiet.
Ray watched him from across the green room, tension crawling under his skin like a live wire. Jim’s skin was flushed, his breath unsteady, scent sweet and thick—already curling into the corners of the room like a warning flare.
Ray didn’t say anything.
He just crossed the room and pressed two fingers under Jim’s jaw.
And Jim whimpered.
________________________________________
The heat hit fast.
Hours early.
A full day before they’d expected it.
Jim slid to his knees in the hallway, back arching, eyes blown wide and glassy.
“I can’t—” he gasped. “Ray, it’s—it’s too much—”
Ray caught him. Hauled him up. One arm under his knees, one behind his back.
He didn’t speak.
Didn’t ask.
Just carried him straight to the hotel, shoved the door open with his shoulder, and laid Jim out like a sacrament.
________________________________________
The bond snapped tight.
Ray could feel every tremble, every pulse of slick-slick-need sliding down Jim’s thighs.
He stripped him slowly. Reverently.
And when Jim arched, begging, Ray just growled—
“Say it.”
Jim writhed.
Ray pressed a hand between his legs and said again, voice like a promise of sin, “Say you’re mine.”
“I’m yours,” Jim gasped, nails dragging down Ray’s arms. “Yours, yours—fuck, Ray—”
That was all it took.
________________________________________
Ray tore into him.
No patience. No control. Just hands everywhere—holding, bruising, claiming.
Jim sobbed into the pillow, completely gone. Heat scent dizzying, flooding the room, slick dripping down his thighs in thick waves.
Ray knotted him once.
Then again.
Then again.
________________________________________
Hours passed in a blur of sweat, groans, biting, whispered promises and broken gasps.
Ray bit his throat.
Bit the mark.
Filled him until Jim shook apart, legs trembling, begging for more even as he cried from overstimulation.
“I can’t,” Jim whimpered, boneless and spent.
Ray kissed his jaw. His neck. Every part of him.
“Yes you can,” he whispered. “You’re mine. You’ll take it.”
And Jim did.
________________________________________
By morning, he couldn’t walk. Could barely speak. His thighs were soaked. His pulse slow, soft and warm like a flame fed until it flickered low.
Ray cradled him.
Fed him. Cleaned him. Kept him curled up against his chest, every inch of Jim wrapped in his scent.
The heat wasn’t over.
But now?
Now they were ready.