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[darkdreamer]

Here's the latest update of Shadows of Doubt. :) I hope you guys like it, please let me know if you do :)

*hugs*
DoS

Title: Shadows of Doubt: A Dark!Wilson House Redux
Episode: 2.7 -- Hunting
Beta: andi88
Disclaimer: House, Wilson, and all other characters/ideas taken from the show are not my own, and I'm making no profit from the writing of this fiction -- just for fun, I promise. :P (Some dialogue this chapter taken directly from the episode.)
Pairing: House/Wilson
Rating: PG-13
Author's Note: In this particular 'verse, I've changed one thing about the canon timeline. At the beginning of the story, when House and Wilson first get together, Wilson is already recently divorced from Julie.
Story Warnings: slash, dark Wilson -- specific warnings for each chapter as necessary
Chapter Warnings: violence, abuse
Story Summary: A darker version of how canon might have gone, if House and Wilson had entered into a relationship from the start -- and if that relationship took a gradually dark, disturbing turn.
Chapter Summary: Wilson finds out about House taking Stacy's file, and reacts very badly.

 

House sat at his small wooden desk in his bedroom, illuminated only by the small desk lamp that sat upon it. He was more relaxed than usual after a long, pleasant ride on his motorcycle, and was now enjoying the peace and quiet of an evening at home alone, poring over the fascinating contents of the file spread out on the desk in front of him.

But it was not a patient that he found so intriguing.

He was so engrossed in what he was reading that he didn’t even hear Wilson come in, wasn’t aware of his presence at all until he felt a strong but gentle arm slide around his shoulders from behind, drawing him back against Wilson’s chest as Wilson’s lips gently caressed the side of his neck.

House couldn’t help but jump at the unexpected contact, his heart leaping up into his throat. Wilson let out a low, throaty laugh against his skin, drawing away to lean forward and look into House’s eyes with a soft smile of affectionate amusement.

“Why so jumpy?”

House shook his head, his mouth suddenly dry and his palms damp as he murmured, “No reason.”

Before Wilson could question the words, House leaned in to return his kiss, raising his arms and turning in his chair to embrace his partner – intent on distracting him before he discovered…

“What are you working on?”

“Nothing, really.”

House insisted with a nervous laugh, reaching instinctively with one hand to cover the open file on his desk. In a single fluid motion, Wilson caught his wrist with one hand, drawing it away from the file and scooping it up swiftly with the other, then turning his back on House and walking a few steps away to prevent him from taking the file back.

“Wilson, that’s none of your business. It’s not what you…”

House’s words were abruptly cut off when Wilson spun around in an instant and backhanded him, hard, sending him stumbling back against the desk. The file dropped to the floor as Wilson advanced on him, catching a handful of his hair to hold his head in place and slamming his fist down across House’s face again. House raised his hands in front of him in a gesture that was both submissive and defensive at once, flinching as Wilson jerked him away from the desk and slammed him into the wall beside it with all his strength.

“Wilson, w-wait, please…”

“Shut up!”

Wilson snarled, delivering another dizzying blow that made House see stars and struggle to keep his footing. Wilson wrapped one hard hand around House’s throat and pinned him to the wall, choking him slightly as he leaned in close to his face to bite off a series of menacing accusations.

“You little whore. What is that, House? Where did you get that? That’s her personal therapy file. You had to have broken into her therapist’s office to get it!” Wilson shook him hard and House bit his lip to still its trembling, his eyes screwed shut in the face of Wilson’s rage as the younger man shouted in his face. “Are you really that obsessed with her, House? Is she still so important to you that you’re willing to go to all that trouble just to spy on her?”

“No, no,” House gasped out, his voice trembling with panic. “No, I just… just wanted to find out if she’s… s-said anything about me, because… she’s been… asking questions, and… and acting all weird around me lately and… I just wanted to know…”

“Weird?” Wilson echoed, his seething tone gaining in fury with every accusing word. “Weird, how? Weird as in… interested in you? Weird as in flirting like a wanton slut? Possibly because you’ve been leading her on for the past few weeks?”

Another vicious slap silenced House’s pleading protest.

“I ran into your little stalker outside, too, by the way,” Wilson continued, furious. “He’s been hanging around the apartment lately, and you’ve told me that he wants you to take his case – but is that really what’s going on, House? Or is he just one more admirer you’re playing?”

“Wilson, no,” House pleaded, his voice hoarse and choked with frustrated, fearful tears. “Wilson, I swear, that’s not it! He’s just some sick guy who wants…”

“What about me, House?” Wilson demanded as if he hadn’t even spoken. “Am I just another idiot you’re playing?”

“No!” The desperate word was nearly a sob. “Wilson, I love you…!”

Wilson slapped him again, following the blow with a brutal punch to his stomach that wound have sent him to his knees had Wilson not been standing so close. Wilson gripped his throat again, and House stared at him with wide-eyed fear, shaking his head to express the frantic plea not allowed to him by Wilson’s choking hand.

“Liar,” Wilson hissed. “You lying little slut.”

He tightened his grip on House’s throat, and House raised a shaking hand in a desperate attempt to pull Wilson’s hand away; but Wilson’s free hand grasped his wrist and slammed it painfully back against the wall, eliciting a sharp, strangled cry of pain from House’s lips. Wilson shifted in closer to House, his voice low and furious and menacing.

“You. Are. Mine, House. Do you understand me?”

House nodded desperately, gasping for breath.

“I will not lose you to some pathetic little whore like that piece of shit outside, and I will not lose you to someone who’s already hurt you as much as Stacy has! She doesn’t deserve you, House, can’t you see that?”

Wilson’s voice was shaking by the end, and he sounded as if he was about to cry, as his grip on House’s throat loosened abruptly, and his hand slid down to rest, trembling, against House’s chest.

“What can she give you that I can’t, House? Why am I not enough for you?”

“You are,” House insisted automatically, his voice a hoarse, painful whisper from Wilson’s assault, his uninjured hand moving to tentatively rest over Wilson’s. “Wilson… I don’t want anyone else… I swear it… I love you, Wilson… there’s nothing going on with Stacy, I swear it…”

Wilson was quiet for a moment, gasping for breath, and House swallowed hard, trying to regain some semblance of control over the situation. His hand tightened slightly around Wilson’s as he whispered in a hushed, cautious tone.

“Wilson… please… I wouldn’t cheat on you, I’d never cheat on you… you have to believe me…”

“God, House, would you just shut up?” Wilson snapped, cutting him off abruptly, slamming his hand into the wall next to House’s head, causing him to flinch violently. “You think I’m stupid? You think you can just play me again? Say all the right things and hope that I turn a blind eye to your unfaithfulness?”

“I’m not being…”

Wilson slapped him again, knocking his head against the wall as he snarled, “I told you to shut up!”

Wilson shoved him hard, releasing a volley of hard, breathtaking blows into House’s face, chest, and stomach. When he was finished, House was huddled, half-sitting and half-kneeling with his back against the wall, holding up one arm to shield his face. Furious, Wilson grabbed his arm and jerked it down with one hand, yanking his head back with the other.

“I can’t stand to look at you right now!”

The words were a vicious hiss in his ear, and the sheer disgust in his voice made House cringe with shame. Wilson shook him slightly by his hair, and House winced in pain, but dared not pull away, his body rigid in his attempt to keep perfectly still and not appear to be resisting Wilson’s control. He held up his shaking hands in front of him in a gesture of submission as Wilson bit off cold orders in his ear.

“I’m going out for a while. You will not leave the apartment until I get back, and you will not let anyone in, is that clear?”

House nodded, too badly shaken to resist at all. “Okay… okay, please…”

Wilson released him with a harsh shove, taking a few backward steps and glaring down at him in repulsion. He snatched up his car keys from the desk where he had set them, then grabbed House’s keys for good measure before stalking out the door, slamming it hard behind him.

Wilson came home hours later, much calmer and more in control. Still, he was frigid and skeptical when it came to House’s anxiously repeated insistences that he had not been unfaithful to Wilson and would never be. He stepped very close to House, completely invading his space, to softly suggest that maybe House would be better off not pressing the issue.

House wisely took the warning and gave Wilson his space for the rest of the evening.

At the end of the night, however, Wilson approached him again, slipping up behind him and wrapping his arms around him, coaxing him toward their bed. House was shaky and uncertain, too scared to object, despite the fact that he was too sore – both physically and emotionally – to be in much of a mood for anything.

Wilson held him close, whispering vague reassurances in his ear, words designed to ease the tension between them without absolving House of the assumed responsibility for what had happened.

“I can’t share you, House,” he murmured. “I love you too much.”

House was quiet for a long time before whispering in a voice thick with emotion, “You don’t have to.”

*****************************

As it turned out, House’s stalker was actually sick.

The next morning, House was barely able to move without pain – but that was no different than many of his normal days. The bruises that marred his face, he would explain away as the results of another fight – or perhaps an altercation with the young man outside his apartment, he decided on the way to the hospital in Wilson’s car.

As if having to treat the man that Wilson viewed as a threat was not bad enough, Cuddy insisted that he go to see Stacy immediately upon his arrival at the hospital. The incident outside his apartment could be a legal issue, he knew, so there was a valid reason for the visit to Stacy’s house, since she was out for the day.

House wasn’t sure if Wilson would see it as valid, however.

He had the utterly valid excuse that Cuddy was giving him no choice in the matter, of course – but Wilson might not accept that. House found him in the clinic and pulled him aside into an empty exam room, where he hurriedly explained Cuddy’s orders in a trembling, submissive tone. Wilson cursed softly under his breath, visibly angry – though House wasn’t quite sure if that anger was directed at him or not.

“I-I’m sorry,” he stammered, his eyes lowered, trembling visibly. “Wilson, I don’t have a choice…”

“Okay,” Wilson muttered, shaking his head, pacing irritably back and forth. “Okay, I get it… I understand. Just… do what you have to do and get it over with and get back here, okay?”

House gratefully agreed, relieved to have escaped the situation so easily. He was reluctant to meet with Stacy, well aware of what her reaction to his new injuries was likely to be; but he had no choice in the matter. When he arrived at her house, he was tense and distant, sticking to the business at hand only – and to her credit, Stacy did not say a word about the fresh bruises that mottled his face.

Discussing Kalvin’s medical case, and the incident that had occurred between them that morning, took only a few moments; but that time was not uneventful, as it was interrupted by the appearance of a rat that caused a great deal of panicked shrieking on Stacy’s part – and an instantaneous fascination on House’s part, when he happened to notice a symptom.

“You never could resist a challenge,” Stacy mused, shaking her head with an affectionate smile as House picked up the Tupperware dish with holes punched in the top in which he was containing the rodent. “Any unexplained symptom, you have no choice but to figure out.”

House couldn’t help but return her smile, carried back to better times by the nostalgic tone in her voice. All at once, he was overcome with a wistful sensation of longing, as he remembered the good times they had shared, and thought about how happy they had been together… for a time.

He realized with some surprise that he had actually enjoyed this little visit. Stacy had not pressed him on personal issues, and they had actually gotten along well – and Wilson knew that he was there, and had no reason to be upset with him about it.

Later that day, when House managed to get into a fight with the patient’s father and was promptly instructed by Cuddy to have another meeting with the staff attorney, House couldn’t help but feel a little bit of pleasant anticipation at the thought. He explained what had happened to Wilson, who sighed wearily, but agreed that, once again, he had no choice.

As House made his way to Stacy’s office, he thought that perhaps he would have to start finding other potential legal issues to place him in her path.

***************************

Stacy sighed as she sat at her desk, thinking about House’s rather eventful visit that afternoon, her mind filled with troubling images of the new marks she had seen on his face. Despite her concerns, she knew that grilling him about it again would only serve to push him farther away, so she had kept quiet about it and done her best to make him feel at ease with her.

I know something’s not right… I know he’s hiding something from me… but at least he’s talking to me at all, for a change… Maybe, if we can get to be friends again… maybe he’ll eventually tell me what’s going on…

A soft knock on her door drew her attention, and she looked up with a slightly guarded smile.

“Hi, there.”

Her visitor did not return her smile, his own expression solemn and troubled as he stepped into her office, closing the door firmly behind him. He took a seat across from her desk without a word, and laid a blue file folder on the desk in front of her. She looked down at it with a puzzled frown that became startled, and then indignant, when she recognized the name on it – her own.

Wilson gave her an apologetic grimace, his voice halting and regretful.

“I found this in with House’s things. I… just thought you should know…"

TBC...