#but spadino reaches for him first in both

[weardes]

[santipietroepaolo]

21 and/or 62? Spadeliano! Love your stories ❤️

I did my best to combine them! Thank you so much for the prompts 💕

[Read on Ao3]

21. "Who hurt you" + 62. Here, take my sweater"

“Who did this?”

That had been the third question out of Spadino’s mouth, in seeing Aureliano cross the threshold of the hotel with a deep frown on his brow and a bloody hand still cupping the side of his neck – right after an embarrassingly panicked “what happened” and an even shakier “you’re hurt.”

“Couple of small fry on a motorbike,” Aureliano gruffed, brushing by Spadino without stopping, making straight for the bar instead, “Flanked the car just as I was leaving Rome – must have been waiting for me.”

He slipped behind the counter and immediately turned the sink on to rinse his bloodied hands. Squinting at a piece of polished brass in front of him, Aureliano tried to catch his reflection in it, searching for a good angle to assess the situation on his neck.

He looked more pissed about his injury than he did bothered by pain of any kind – as often. Still, Spadino – who had all but jumped out of his bar stool to rush to him moments earlier – hurried back to join him and force him to turn around.

“Let me see that,” he said, grabbing Aureliano’s chin to get him to turn his head and show him the extent of the damage.

Aureliano scoffed, but didn’t evade the touch.

“Relax, it’s nothing. The bullet just grazed me. Kids these days can’t aim for shit.”

He was right: the gunshot had not penetrated the muscle, but it had still left a bad scrape on its way, starting right under Aureliano’s ear and ending just short of his Adam’s apple, nearly missing the top arch of his tattooed wing. He’d been shot almost point blank: there were traces of burns at the start of the still-bleeding cut, and some of the surrounding stubble was singed off. Spadino felt a scorching rage boil up in his insides.

“Take this off and stand under the light,” he instructed, a bit more gruffly than he meant to, tugging at the collar of Aureliano’s leather jacket and pointing him towards the best spot on the counter to lean against, “I’m going to clean you up.”

He half-expected Aureliano to dismiss him again, but the man just sighed and did as he was told, muttered curse on his lips. While Aureliano shrugged off the jacket, Spadino dampened the nearest clean rag under the faucet before turning to face him. Carefully, he started wiping off blood around the cut, and off Aureliano’s throat and neck, down to his clavicle, where it had dribbled over and stained the collar of his t-shirt. The man didn’t flinch once.

“Where do you keep the first aid kit?” Spadino asked.

“Second drawer – right behind you.”

Spadino pulled some gauze and rubbing alcohol from the kit and went back at his task with more precision. Once the wound was unobstructed, it was clearly nothing too serious. Instead of feeling calmed by that knowledge, Spadino realized the tightness in his chest had only squeezed in harder, and that his back was still stiff with anger. A close call. Way too close.

He had started to get antsy, earlier, when Aureliano hadn’t showed up on time for their meeting, despite having been the one to set it up. Drummed his fingers on the marble of the counter and spun around on his stool like an idiot, in the silence of the empty hotel, pondering whether he should send Aureliano a text asking where the hell he was, or just wait a little longer for him to show up before trying.

He could very well have waited for him forever. With his fingers brushing against the warm skin of Aureliano’s neck, watching blood ooze scarlet from that ugly cut, that realization was slowly sinking into Spadino – and it made him sick to his stomach. Aureliano was standing still and breathing steady – patient, for once, simply waiting for him to be done. So close to Spadino’s chest, right between his hands, his body gave off a steady heat and a faint smell of iron and gunpowder, mixed-in with his usual, familiar scent of leather and aftershave.

If Aureliano had been shot only an inch further to the right, or at a better angle, the bullet would have severed his carotid. Possibly blown his throat wide open, depending on the caliber. In both cases, he would have bled out in a matter of seconds – gasping and choking on mouthfuls of his own blood, with his head resting against the steering wheel of his faithful Jeep. Alone.

And Spadino would have been none the wiser.

“How’s your hearing?” he forced himself to ask, to keep his mouth busy and not focus on the taste of bile that had just coated his tongue.

It came out choppy, too flat in affect to sound natural. Aureliano didn’t seem to notice.

“My ear’s ringing like a motherfucker,” he simply answered, head still craned sideways to give Spadino better access to the wound, “But the drum’s not blown- I don’t think. Asshole didn’t get even a second shot in there - man, I’m gonna be so pissed if this fucks with my ink.”

Aureliano sighed, then, fingers tensing ever-so-slightly around the edge of the counter as Spadino patted the wound with an alcohol-soaked compress.

“I told you, it’s nothing,” Aureliano shrugged, “I’ve got some antibiotics somewhere. I’ll pop a couple of those if I need to and be more than fine.”

Spadino was glad his fingers were now busy cutting some gauze and tape down to a decent dressing to bandage the wound – or else Aureliano might have seen them shaking slightly.

“So you didn’t see who it was at all?” he asked, aware that he was failing miserably to match Aureliano’s unnervingly dismissive tone, “Samurai’s men, maybe someone from here? My family?”

Aureliano shrugged again. A sloppy kind of hit like that could have literally anyone behind it, including minor players they might not even be aware of.

It wasn’t exactly like Aureliano lacked enemies.

“No – like I said. They had helmets on, and besides, I was a little too busy driving off to avoid being turned into a pasta strainer to get a good look at them, you know? Get off my back about it.”

Spadino shook his head no. An attack like that on Aureliano, in broad daylight… Something like that could not go unpunished. Not on his watch. Because if it did, it meant that it could happen again. And that it could succeed, next time.

And that thought was unbearable.

“I’m going to get my feelers out first thing tonight,” Spadino said darkly, leaning back in to start bandaging the wound he was already promising himself to avenge, “Find whatever scum was dumb enough to try this.”

If he kept his focus on what he wanted to do to the people responsible, maybe he could avoid lingering on the primal fear he still felt choking his throat at the creeping thought that even someone like Aureliano – always alert, and with firepower to spare – could be snuffed out in less than a blink – without Spadino being able to do jack shit about it.

“The second I get my hands on those pieces of shit, I swear, I’m gonna make them-”

“Jesus, Spadì, I said back off!”

Aureliano had not raised his voice by a lot, but still enough to startle him. Spadino lifted his gaze, only to be met with pale blue eyes, staring at him cold and unkind.

“Drop the macho routine,” Aureliano said, icy, “I’m not your fucking girlfriend.”

Something like a dagger twisted cruel inside Spadino’s belly. Suddenly the skin of Aureliano’s neck singed the tips of his fingers, and he wanted to shove himself back – or lunge at the man fists forward, maybe – he wasn’t really sure which.

What Spadino did instead of any of that, however, was lean in, and smile – something ugly and contorted. That was what he always did, when cornered: raised his chin and never showed belly, rather letting that unhinged smirk be his shield instead – however flimsy and unsettling.

“You know what, Aurelià?” Spadino sneered, getting well into the taller man’s space and staring straight into his ocean eyes as if doing so didn’t make him want to crawl out of his own skin, “Fuck you. You can bandage your own damn self.”

And with that, he slapped the finished dressing at the center of Aureliano’s chest, before storming off – not waiting to see the man’s reaction, or check if he had been able to catch the gauze before it hit the floor.

Spadino wanted to get as far away from him as he possibly could, so he thought about leaving – but then he remembered the five or so men Aureliano had standing guard right outside the door. Veering off the corridor, he made straight for the balcony instead: he needed some air, urgently, but he didn’t want anyone seeing him like he was right then – short of breath, with his jaw wired shut and his hands balled into fists to keep them from shaking.

A bit of a breeze welcomed him, when he stepped outside. It somewhat helped soothe the burn of searing humiliation he felt prickling all over the skin of his face and neck.

Resting both hands on the metal railing of the balcony, Spadino dipped his head between his arms to pull in a long, needed breath of fresh Ostiense air – somehow smoggy, but with the faint smell of the nearby sea managing to power through and reach him. When he raised his gaze, he saw that one of his hands was stained with blood – a dark streak across his thumb and down to his wrist. Aureliano’s blood. He wiped at it as hard as he could with the hem of his sleeve.

He was such a fucking idiot. He’d been so overwhelmed with panic at the thought of Aureliano dying, at the sight of him injured, that he’d forgotten himself completely – forgotten he wasn’t meant to hover and coo over him that way –not in a million years. Forgotten that him being protective of Aureliano was both a ridiculous and unwelcome notion – as Aureliano had just made abundantly clear.

He saw right through him, in moments like these, didn’t he? Alberto was sure of it. Those unforgiving blue eyes were able to spy all the sad, pathetic thoughts Spadino’s mind conjured up, whenever Aureliano dropped his guard down enough to let him slither any kind of close. Anytime something like that happened, Spadino just had to make it weird, didn’t he? He had scrubbed the blood so hard off his hand that he’d irritated the skin underneath.

He was transparent and pathetic.

“Spadì.”

Spadino squeezed his eyes shut. Great, so Aureliano wasn’t even done, yet. Spadino didn’t want to turn around to find the man staring at him with that closed-off, hostile look on his face again. He had to find a way to get this over with fast, or else he knew his nerves were going to take over completely again.

However unwise for their alliance, it felt so much easier to pounce and fight with Aureliano than it did to stand there and let the man rub in his disgust with him.

But when Alberto whipped around, bitter words of dismissal gathered on his tongue and ready to be spat out, Aureliano didn’t look nauseated at all. He didn’t even look mad, really. He was just standing by the bay window with his gaze firmly pointed away from Spadino’s face – somewhere towards the line of roofs that hid the sea-line from their sight.

Aureliano sniffed, cleared his throat, then gestured vaguely at his neck with the bandage in his hand.

“I can’t see what the fuck I’m doing,” he admitted, “I can’t put it on on my own – you need to do it.”

He looked almost contrite, in that sullen way of his. Spadino breathed in deep. He should probably have stuck to his plan of making things worse, and tell Aureliano to fuck right off.

But he was weak, and he didn’t want to do that.

“Come here,” Spadino said instead, managing to sound at least a little annoyed, which he mentally congratulated himself for, “Give me that thing.”

He wasn’t as delicate with his hands as he had been earlier. Without meeting his eyes once, Spadino just short of slapped the dressing in place, making Aureliano flinch and hiss in surprise more than pain, for the first time that evening. It was a childish thing to do, and Spadino regretted it instantly – but did his best not to show it on his face.

“There,” he grumbled, turning away and going back to lean his elbows on top of the guardrail, “All patched up. Now you can leave me alone.”

With the corner of his eye, he saw Aureliano’s nostrils flare, and heard the angry puff of air he huffed out of his nose. Spadino should probably be more careful how he handled Aureliano: the man had his temper too – one famously easy to trigger.

Spadino knew that better than most.

“This is my place, in case you forgot,” Aureliano bit back, as if to prove the point, “I can do whatever the fuck I want.”

He slammed his hands on the balustrade too – right next to Spadino’s elbow – and stood firmly there.

Now who was childish?

“Fine,” Spadino scoffed, adjusting himself and staring stubbornly ahead, “Suit yourself.”

Aureliano said nothing back, and the silence lingered. Spadino found himself starting to fidget annoyingly fast. Maybe he still wanted to push Aureliano’s buttons, he realized. Make him really mad at him – mad enough to say something worse than what he’d said earlier – something unforgivable. The shouting match that would ensue seemed so much easier to deal with that whatever this awkwardness was. If he got into a bad enough fight with Aureliano, he’d feel justified walking away from there – maybe for good, this time. That way, he wouldn’t have to worry about him – about his stupid neck, his stupid life – about any of it, anymore.

As if that would work. It surely hadn’t the last time Spadino had tried something similar – with his knife to Aureliano’s throat, at around the same spot where the bandage now was.

It had rained during the day, and with that little breeze still blowing, the evening was surprisingly fresh for a roman June. It wasn’t enough for Spadino to feel cold at all, but much to his surprise, right next to him, Aureliano suddenly shivered. From fatigue more than anything, probably, or pain, or the down of the adrenaline rush he must have felt earlier during the attack.

Aureliano sniffed and pretended like nothing happened, standing there in just his blood-stained t-shirt, frowning and stiff and looking pale in that humid wind, with that fresh bandage on his neck and deep circles under his eyes. His head must have been killing him way more than the bullet graze, in that moment, Spadino knew. A gun discharging that close to one’s ear would give anyone a migraine to last for days.

Why was he still there? What the hell did he want, if it wasn’t berating Spadino some more?

Aureliano shivered again.

“Bloody hell,” Spadino cursed, pushing himself off the balcony, “Here, take my sweater.”

Aureliano frowned at him, then opened his mouth to say something.

“Shut up,” Spadino cut him off before he could even try, “Just take it. Or go back inside to get something of yours – I don’t give a fuck. Clearly you’re not done saying your piece yet, are you? Might as well not catch your death while you figure out what slur to call me this time.”

That was also a childish thing to say, but they were way past all that, now, weren’t they? Spadino had had plenty of time to unzip the hoodie and slip it off his back, during that tirade of his, so he chose to punctuate it by just shoving the sweater in Aureliano’s hands.

“If you don’t like being babied, maybe stop acting like such a toddler,” Spadino scoffed, going back to his position, “For fuck’s sake.”

This time, he was sure to have done it. Aureliano stood in total silence – Spadino could feel the burn of his stare drilling into the side of his face. But instead of exploding at him, and maybe replacing that look on his cheek with the crash of his knuckles, Aureliano just dipped his gaze. Tight-lipped and with his brow furrowed, he slipped the brightly-patterned hoodie on, in total silence. The golden baroque, sun-themed detailing clashed so hard with his expression and with his usual style of dress that it could have made Spadino laugh to see it on him, in other circumstances.

Instead all he could manage was to do his best not get caught staring. Aureliano adjusted the hoodie over his shoulders, with his nose a little scrunched.

“Why is this thing so… shiny,” he grumbled, seemingly to no one in particular.

Spadino scoffed out the weak parody of a chuckle.

“That thing’s Versace, you dick.”

Aureliano sighed, deep and tired, and then came back to rest against the balustrade - with his hip, that time. Facing him.

“Spadì, listen,” he started, “You went all – intense back there. That… fucks with me. You can’t be doing that, not with my men right next door. It’s dangerous.”

At that, Spadino had no choice but to turn and face him. That was a mistake, because meeting Aureliano’s serious eyes reminded him exactly why they were in that predicament, in the first place.

“You expect me to not give a fuck if you’re hurt?” Spadino asked, unable to mask his disbelief at that concept.

That was not what he had meant to ask: he had meant to bounce off the “dangerous” thing and bark at Aureliano to pray tell exactly what in God’s green Earth made him think he was in any position to tell him, of all people, what was dangerous and what wasn’t about caring for him the way he did. But instead, Spadino’s voice had gone quieter, and all he could feel where all of that anger used to be, was grief.

He was so bad at lying to Aureliano. When faced with those eyes Alberto often found he had no choice but to be honest – in a painfully powerless way.

Much to his surprise, Aureliano dipped his gaze again.

“No, that’s not-” he started, laboriously, “Not what I meant. Cause if it was you walking in hurt like that, I'd also-”

He closed his mouth, and swallowed hard. Spadino saw his jaw twitch as he did so, but he was almost too busy stifling the shiver running down his spine to notice it.

Luckily for him, Aureliano cleared his throat and went on before Spadino could even think of trying to tackle the impossible task of finding something to answer to that enormity.

“Look, I’m sorry about the girlfriend thing. I shouldn’t have said that.”

And I shouldn’t be in love with you like this, Spadino thought, but here we fucking are.

“Yeah, well.”

Turning away once more, Spadino resisted the urge to adjust the collar of his shirt around his neck. Why did he feel so clammy and suffocated, all of the sudden, when barely minutes earlier he was enjoying that fine fresh breeze?

Unable to act aloof, Spadino settled for just scratching the side of his nose, and fall back behind the trusted, well-worn defence of irony.

“You are wearing my clothes,” he quietly joked, raising his brow, and fishing up the guts to throw Aureliano a little sideways glance.

Whether Aureliano found that funny, or simply let it slide on account of what he’d said earlier, Spadino couldn’t really tell. All he could see was that instead of clicking his tongue or jumping out of that hoodie in disgust, Aureliano just dipped his head and cocked his own brow – with an ever-so-light smirk tugging at the corner of his lip.

“Right. Your Versace.”

Months down the line, Spadino would still wonder where he’d found the strength of will not to crash his mouth all over the smile on Aureliano lips, when the man raised it back at him.

“Lucky me.”