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Clint sunk down slow, his thighs just starting to burn from the strain, until his hole was clenched snug around Steve's growing knot, reveling in the warm fullness only a live and in-color cock could give him, that a knotting dildo just couldn't quite emulate.
And that was the thing that was so great about Steve--not his knot. Or, well, not just his knot. No, it was that Steve understood that Clint needed certain things to get through his heat without wanting to claw his eyeballs out by the end of it. Things like a real alpha knot, but also things like total control over that alpha knot because Clint may be an omega, but that didn’t automatically rewire his whole personality, okay? He wasn’t about to flip over and push his ass in the air for some rutting alpha to just have their way with him. Oh no, Clint was what his previous partners called pushy or bossy or even toppy. Steve never said any of those things; at least not to Clint’s face, anyway.
No, Steve never complained about Clint shoving Steve down on his back so Clint could crawl all over him and handle things how Clint wanted. Instead, Steve said things like, “It’s your heat. Which position’s the most comfortable for you?”
Steve was kind of stupidly perfect, honestly.
(Fucking heat, first it was all about getting him horny, then once that impulse was satisfied, it turned him into a giant sap.)
The building pressure suddenly leveled off as Steve’s knot finished locking Clint in place, and with a pleased sigh, Clint felt his bones melting to absolute soup in relief. Even the come drying tacky on his stomach was a far off concern in the wake of a heat-slaking orgasm in the midst of happy alpha pheromones. But no sooner than Clint had flopped forward to nestle his face in the groove made by Steve’s ridiculously defined pecs, the world quaked under him and up was down, down was up, and Steve was the only anchor.
A frisson of panic surging through him--they were attached goddammit, and having a full knot yanked out fucking hurt--Clint’s legs flailed up and out until he managed to clamp them around Steve’s waist in self-defense. Flat on his back seconds later with Steve and his stupid smug face looming over him, Clint glared and shot a hand out quick to pinch one of Steve’s nipples and twist. But Steve, because he was an absolute dick , didn’t yowl or flinch or even glare back at Clint. No, the asshole fucking moaned and dropped down onto his forearms so he was close enough to plunder Clint’s mouth again.
Steve was kind of a rat bastard, honestly.
Steve pulled back with a pleased hum, smiling all soft and sex-hazed at first, but it took on a definite edge of mischief as he said, “Now that I’ve got you here--”
Oh, Steve was the very rattiest of bastards--
Eyes wide, Clint cut him off with a firm, “Don’t you fucking dare--”
But Steve steamrolled right over his protests and began to sing, “You are so beautiful~ To me!~”
“Cease and desist!” Clint demanded, trying to shove Steve off of him, but that was a moot point really, ‘cause dude’s a frigging brickhouse and, as previously mentioned, they were literally attached at the, uh, hipish area. “This is cruel and unusual punishment!”
“Is it the song choice?” Steve asked around a laugh, settling in and around Clint like a blanket, covering him from every conceivable angle. “Because JARVIS helped me compile a playlist.”
“Filthy traitors, the whole lot of you,” Clint grumbled. Then, with that cruel vein of insight that’d served him so well in survival up until this point, Clint let one leg fall loose from his death-grip on Steve’s hips, lifted it to aim just so, and brought it back down hard, right at the back of Steve’s knee where a well-placed hit always crumpled him in sparring.
With a yelp, Steve jerked back instinctively, and Clint rolled with the movement, up and over so that Steve was on his back again under Clint, completely at Clint’s mercy.
(It was really the best in a long line of good looks for Steve.)
Steve started laughing, even as Clint’s squirming to get comfortable again pulled at his knot in the not-fun way, and his hands started smoothing up and down Clint’s sides, the touch too firm and deliberate to tickle. “Ow, geez, where do you think you’re going, huh?” he asked with a teasing little smirk. “You’re stuck with me. Forever.”
“For half an hour, maybe,” Clint snarked back, bearing down on Steve’s knot just so and watching in vindictive glee as Steve’s eyes rolled back up in his head and he noticeably lost the train of conversation for precious seconds. “But after that?” Clint patted at Steve’s pecks in mock-consolation. “Tough luck there, bud.”
“Least an hour,” Steve mumbled hazily after a moment, his words slurring that telling little bit around the edges. “Magic Serum Knot, ‘member?”
“Ugh,” Clint scoffed. “You don't get to throw things back in my face that I said in the--the throes of heat, you fucking asshole.”
“I'll fuck your asshole,” Steve immediately returned nonsensically, grinning up at Clint all the same.
Clint rolled his eyes and bent forward so that he could make a pillow of his arms on Steve’s chest and prop his chin up on them. “Well, I mean, mission basically accomplished.”
Steve ducked forward to press a quick, sloppy kiss to Clint’s forehead. “Mm, love you.”
Clint snorted dismissively. “Sure you do.”
And aha, there it was again, that hideously mischievous streak of Steve’s that he did a truly deplorable job of hiding. “I do, I do, I do-ooo,” he replied, sing-song.
Clint dropped his head to the side so that he could stare at wall instead of Steve’s stupidly perfect face. “Everybody loves everybody after they’ve come,” he muttered with a sigh.
Steve’s answering sigh bore the marks of a long-lost argument he’d resigned himself to the task of continuing to bring up, and Clint adored him just a bit for it.
“Yeah, well, I love you all the time,” Steve said, burying a hand in Clint’s hair and combing his fingers through it in just the way he knew Clint loved best because he was an absolute cheat at cards and an even worse cheat at this. “Not just after I come.”
“You only say it after you have,” Clint couldn’t help but point out, not a little bit snottily.
“I only specifically tell you whenever we’re like this--knotted together, I mean--” Yes, because Clint was sure to have forgotten that salient point by now. “Because it's the only time you can’t run off on me and disappear into the vents for a week to hide from feelings.”
“Whatever,” Clint mumbled into the bend of his elbow. “It's not that I don't l--” His voice cut out on him then, like the word just got clogged on it’s way up his throat. “I just can't say--”
But Steve, stupidly perfect Steve, jumped in before Clint could hurt himself, with a simple, “I know.”
“Ugh, no.” Clint lifted his head just enough that Steve could catch the full might of his glare. “You don't get to be both the Han and the Leia in this situation, dickface. ‘Cause frankly, that just leaves some creepy connotations as to who I'm meant to be in this scenario.”
Steve nodded, that grave kind of nod that meant he was in fact laughing on the inside. “Okay, we’ll start over. I’ll line up the pitch, you knock it outta the park.”
“Fine, whatever. Fucking dork.”
“Takes one to know one. Which is why…” Steve paused there, letting the tension build until Clint finally smacked it out of him. “I love you.”
Nose in the air, Clint replied with a sniff, “Quite right to.”
Steve’s laughter was always so genuine and booming when something made him truly happy. It spread to every corner of the room and echoed all the way down to Clint’s ribcage like Steve just wanted to fill Clint up with that same happiness. Feeling a blush heat his cheeks, Clint ducked his head back into his folded arms and let Steve’s love surround him for a little bit longer.