Leather and Tea
By K.L. Noone
Ben Smith came home early, on a damp stone-colored evening full of coastal gloom; he let himself in through the front door and paused to smile, because the air was filled with the scent of tea and the low rumble of the heat turned on, and the even warmer sight of his husband curled up under blankets on the pillowy sofa.
He set down his bag and kicked off his shoes and padded across the carpet, soundless out of long-established habit. Shed keys and watch and gun and other gun along the way, leaving them all on a side table along with the weariness of the mission, and sat down carefully next to Simon on the sofa. The pillows attempted, as they generally did, to swallow him up in fluff. He poked them in retaliation, surreptitiously. They always had liked Simon
