by Rowan Shaw
"I don't know how long I can survive here," he said so low I could barely hear him. "I love your parents, but I miss our place."
"It's only been three days," I reminded him. "And we had sex last night."
"We're staying here a week. I might die."
I shook my head at him. "I know you can behave."
"Do your parents know what my art is about?" he changed the topic.
I bit my lip, hiding a smirk. "Oh, trust me, they know. Mom has watched all of Noah's YouTube videos, including the one of you starting to draw that all-male threesome."
Adrien winced, then blushed a deep red. Though they were forced to tone it down and keep the erotica to a minimum on Noah's channels, it was pretty obvious what Adrien's art was about.
"Well, well, well, are you being coy, Monsieur Dupuis?" I laughed.
"Pffff, right."
"You're blushing."
"I'm not."
"She's probably your biggest fan, you know?"
"Please tell me she doesn't own a piece."
I laughed against him. "No, but I'm sure if you wanted to make a painting just for her birthday, she'd be elated. She thinks you're Van Gogh or something."
"Well, that doesn't bode well for me. Van Gogh had a terrible life. When's her birthday?"
"In three months."
"We still have time."
My gaze dropped to his lips while Adrien's fingers played with the hair at the nape of my neck. "Sooo..." I started.
His dark eyes filled with suspicion when my voice trailed off. "What?"
"Well, I was wondering if you would ever consider getting a dog."
"Nope, nuh uh." He almost pulled away.
"Why not?" I clung to his waist so he couldn't walk out of this discussion.
"Ila will freak. She'll rip the poor thing to pieces before it's even made it past the threshold."
I laughed at that. "You're not giving her enough credit. She's a lot sweeter than you make her out to be."
"I've had her for seven years. I think I know her better than you, even if you like to think you're her best friend."
"Couldn't we try?" I begged.
"And what? If she doesn't accept the dog, we'll abandon it? That's cruel, Raphaël."
"I talked about it with Noah. He said he'll adopt the dog if Ila has an issue."
Adrien sucked on his teeth. "You have it all figured out already, I see."
"I'd like a French bulldog or a cocker spaniel."
Adrien sighed deeply. He leaned into me for another kiss when my mom exited the kitchen, walking in on us.
"Oh, did you see your dad around?" she asked without apologizing for almost knocking me over.
I disentangled myself from Adrien's grasp. "He's in the backyard."
"What is he doing there?" She wiped her hands on her apron.
"Pulling some weeds."
"It's not the time for that. Florian and Enzo are about to arrive. I need your dad's help here. The backyard can wait."
"Sure, Mom." I hoped she would calm down a bit. It wasn't like this was the first time she had Florian over. "Let me go get Dad," I said, watching Adrien follow her back into the kitchen before I proceeded toward the back door.
"Can you please come here?" my mom shouted as I was about to open it.
"You have to choose: do I get Dad or do I come help you?"
"Don't be snarky with me, jeune homme," she shot back just as loudly.
I laughed to myself and went to the yard to call my dad, who insisted the weeds would only take a few more minutes. When I stepped back inside and the doorbell rang, my mom came running out of the kitchen, nearly freaking out that Florian and Enzo were here so early. She let them into the foyer, where they both wiped their feet in unison in between kisses on my mom's cheeks.
"Food is not ready yet," she exclaimed.
"We'll help you," Enzo said with a smile, sliding his coat off and hooking it to the rack. "What do you need us to do?"
"You're guests. You go sit down and wait," Mom insisted, pointing at the couch.
"Florian is no more of a guest than I am," I retorted, closing the door behind them.
Her lips thinned as she locked her thundering gaze on me. "The last time you were here, you didn't help at all. Adrien did everything. Now it's your turn to help. Florian can do that next time."
Florian raised his hands at me like he didn't want to be part of that argument.
"Coward," I whispered at him, drawing a smirk from his lips.
Adrien came out of the kitchen and joined us, wiping his wet hands on a kitchen towel before he shook Enzo's. He beheld Florian without a word and gave him a handshake as well. I was about to introduce them when my mom looked at us in turn. "When we're done, I want a picture with my four sons."
For the second time today, Adrien blushed. I knew he loved it when my parents called him "son." He pretended he didn't care, but his eyes gleamed every time, while his mouth quirked into a tiny smile. I watched as he struggled to conceal his feelings and slipped away to hide in the kitchen.
"Enzo, are you sure your mom doesn't mind you spending Easter here?" my mom asked, motioning for them both to head to the living room.
"No, it's fine. We spent Christmas there. It's only fair we spend Easter with you."
Though there'd been a fight when Enzo's parents found out he was dating Florian again, Enzo hadn't stepped down until they apologized and embraced Florian as their own. It seemed everything had returned to normal, though Florian hadn't shared many details.
Mom nodded, shifting from one foot to the next. "Okay, then. If you say it's fine."
I left them to find Adrien in the kitchen. I was happy the charlotte aux framboises was already made. Adrien had teased me about my lack of culinary skills countless times already, but all I had to do was arrange the raspberries on top of the cake.
When my mom returned and did the dishes, I spent the following twenty minutes helping Adrien make a chocolate mousse as well. He rewarded me by making a mess of my face when he forced me to lick the wooden spoon, then rubbed it all over my right cheek, using that as an excuse to kiss and lick my skin.
"Mmm, miam. Can't wait till tonight," he whispered in my ear, making me shiver.
With a quick glance, I made sure my mom was still busy doing the dishes. "Only if you promise we're getting that puppy."
He burst out laughing, making me wave for him to quiet it down. Just as I feared, my mom threw us a sideways glimpse. Thankfully, she didn't seem to have heard our conversation.
"That's manipulation," Adrien said.
When I made a face, he leaned over my ear. "We can have a puppy...only if you let me do that thing we talked about."
"What thing?" I asked out loud then bit my lip. "What thing?" I repeated in a whisper.
"The thing you never want to let me try."
"That's blackmail," I hissed.
"You won't say that when I make you come out of your mind."
I rolled my eyes at him. "Fine."
"Yeah? You're sure?"
I was a bit nervous, but I gave a nod. Adrien had asked many times if he could do me while using a dildo for double penetration. He promised me he'd done it before, and I would be fine. I wasn't so sure. He'd offered to let me try it on him first, but that didn't make me comfortable either.
"Are you really sure?" he asked, looking at me intently. "I don't want to force you if you're not comfortable with it. I was just kidding about the puppy. You can have a dog even if we don't do this."
"Did you really bring the toy here?" I asked, rounding my eyes at him.
He bit his lip and didn't reply. I couldn't believe him. He'd brought a sex toy to my parents' house.
"If we get caught, that's on you." There was no way I could keep quiet with two dicks—albeit one of them fake—up my ass.
He laughed at me. "I didn't bring it here, Raphaël. Goodness, you're kinky."
I smacked his arm.
"We'll try it at home," he said i
n my ear, "but only if you beg me for it. And trust me...you will."
Before I could react, he brought the spoon to my nose, leaving a trail of chocolate all over it. I complained, spreading the chocolate everywhere when I tried to wipe it off, which only made Adrien chuckle harder.
I was too elated to really scold him. I couldn't wait to meet our puppy. If Adrien was already treating me like a boyfriend back when we were just fucking, he now treated me like a husband. He didn't even seem to realize he was doing it either.
My parents had basically adopted him as their own the instant they'd met him too, and Céleste was now a full part of our lives. It meant the world to me to see Adrien smile genuinely and so regularly, even if he still had bouts of depression that never seemed to fully go away. He was getting better slowly, and I hoped that in time, the wounds inflicted by his family would heal completely.
He smiled at me when he caught me staring at his gorgeous face and gave me a wink before whispering in my ear, "I love you. You know that, right?"
Yes, I knew that. Just like him, I could barely wait to go home and see what the rest of the year had in store for us.
Chapter 1
PATRICK
"What song did you choose for the set tonight?"
From his stool facing his vanity, Jean-François brushed his dark brown hair into loose curls falling over his shoulders and batted his long eyelashes, sending me a glance through the reflection in the mirror. "Shape Of You."
"Nice." I flashed a naughty smile, my legs crossed at the knees as I leaned back with my hands propped on his bed.
His entire room was as extravagant as he was—the headboard of his king-size bed ornamented to an excessive point, his light purple walls covered in paintings so charged with designs, they reminded me of Chagall. Messy piles of clothes were spread everywhere—even on his magenta comforter. My instincts wanted me to clean it all up, but the one time I'd dared touch his stuff, Jean-François had thrown a fit and nearly kicked me out of his room.
I'd known him since middle school. Back then, it was just him and me against the world, the only two queers actually out of the closet in a hostile environment where our "difference" wasn't always welcome. Like me, Jean-François didn't give a damn what people thought. If anything, we both got a thrill out of antagonizing anti-queer assholes. Though we were purely friends and never had full-blown sex back then, kissing was always on the table when it came to pissing off the homophobes. We'd experimented a bit in high school but never went farther than a blow job here and there.
Then Jean-François and I met different guys, and we stopped fooling around. At age twenty-seven, our lives were drastically different, but that never affected our friendship.
"Is Enzo coming tonight?" he asked, leaning toward his mirror to check his mascara.
I shook my head. "He's still moping."
"Please tell me this isn't going to turn into another Cyrille episode. I don't think I can deal with that a second time."
"I don't know." I let out a long sigh. "I told him not to date a bi guy. He wouldn't listen. What d'you want me to say?"
Jean-François cut me a narrow-eyed glance over his shoulder. "You do realize I'm pan, right?"
"Not the same."
"How so?"
"Because I've never dated a pan guy."
My friend shook his head and applied some brown shadow to his cheeks. "Is this still about Cédric? Will you ever let it go?"
I flicked my hand as if all that was in the past and forgotten, which it was—kind of.
"You dated one asshole in high school. One. He just happened to be bi. It doesn't mean they're all bad."
My jaw ticked. Jean-François knew better than to start that argument with me. He rolled his eyes through his reflection and rubbed his cheeks with a tissue to smooth out his makeup before raising his chin to apply some gloss to his lips.
"God, that asshole messed you up. He was lucky I wasn't working out back then. I was too scrawny, or I would have kicked his lame ass."
"Trust me, his ass was anything but lame." And neither was the rest of him.
Jean-François spun on his stool, all flamboyance and elegance as he trained his sharp gray eyes on me. "That was seven years ago. Seven years, Patrick. One jackass, and you let him ruin the entire bi population for you. I've been with many bi guys. They're nothing like you described. And, God, those I fucked were good in bed. You're missing out, but whatever."
I pursed my lips, ready to move on. "I was right when I told Enzo not to date Florian, though. One hit at the guy's business, one thing forcing him out of his comfortable closet, and he freaked."
Enzo was my best friend, truly, and I loved him to death. He was almost a brother to me, but there were times when I couldn't deal with his poor taste in men. Since I'd first met him on that day I picked up my sister from work, I had to watch him make poor decision after poor decision—first dating that asshole Cyrille, then hooking up with Florian. He was the sweetest guy I'd ever met, far too kind for his own good. Some people took that to a whole new level and treated him like dirt. I could barely stand to watch him let them tread all over him like a rug.
"You may not like Florian, but I'd never seen Enzo so happy as when they were together," Jean-François said. "You need to do something and fix this."
"Do something like what? The guy acted like a fucking ass and broke Enzo's heart. Why would I want to help them make up?"
"Because Enzo is miserable, and deep down, you know they belong together. They always did and always will. Talk some sense into Florian. You know him better than I do. I've only met him once, but it's clear he loves Enzo. Okay, so he freaked out. So what? Everyone's allowed to make mistakes. We can't all be perfect like you."
I huffed, letting his sarcastic comment slide, but only because it was Jean-François, and he could get away with a lot of shit other people didn't.
"Are you suggesting I kick his ass?" I asked.
I sure liked the thought of that. Actually, I should probably whoop Cyrille's ass as well. It would help me release some frustration.
"I doubt Enzo would appreciate that. All I know is they're perfect for each other, and you want Enzo to be happy. So fix this mess."
I hated it when Jean-François was right, but I was forced to admit Florian was perfect for Enzo, even if he'd managed to fuck up their relationship.
"Fine! I'll go talk to him."
Jean-François smiled and blew me an air kiss. "Thank you."
"How about you? How is the mason doing?"
"Enrique is doing great, thank you very much. Our anniversary is next month. Still rocking hard after five years." He stood, his long, green silk robe reaching his feet.
At least one of my friends had his life under control. He'd met his lover from Spain back when we were twenty-two. They became inseparable almost instantly. He and Enzo were the kind of queers my mom would have liked me to be—romantic and fleur bleue—the type of men who found someone to shack up with and never let go. But that wasn't for me.
"Is Enrique coming tonight?" I asked.
Jean-François flicked his long hair over his shoulder and leaned toward the mirror for one last look at his flawless makeup. "Isn't he always?"
"He still doesn't mind?"
"What?" He stood with his hands around the belt of his robe and headed to his closet, where he undressed to near complete nudity but for his black thong. Like many strippers, Jean-François was scrumptious enough to give most guys in the crowd a hard-on without trying. All he had to do was appear for his fans to go berserk. His chiseled muscles that flexed under his tanned skin, his promising bulge, his sensual moves, all of that drove them nuts.
"Your boyfriend doesn't mind watching all those men drool over you?"
"They never get to touch," he reminded me without batting a lash as he searched through his hanging clothes for the perfect outfit. "Should I be a fireman or a construction worker tonight?"
"Since Enrique will be there, I'd choose the wo
rker. Just for the fun of it."
A naughty glint flashed through his eye. "He definitely loves it when I wear this uniform. Especially when the club allows him backstage and he gets to fuck me while my customers are waiting for their turn to get a lap-dance."
"Spare me the details. I haven't fucked in three weeks," I groaned.
Jean-François laughed so loud, his shoulders shook. "D'you have a case of blue balls?" he teased, his gray eyes twinkling wickedly. "You should remedy to that quickly. I wouldn't want to lose you to a bad case of death by rotten dick."
Unamused, I pursed my lips and ground my teeth while Jean-François wriggled his eyebrows and held his costume in front of his perfect body. "What do you think?"
"Have pity on your poor fans. The club doesn't need to call another ambulance."
Only last week, some guy fainted during the show. It was probably due to the alcohol he'd absorbed, but Jean-François liked to claim it was his own doing. He wouldn't stop bragging about his show being so hot, it made his fans pass out.
"That was definitely the best compliment I've ever received."
I cocked an eyebrow. "A better compliment than Enrique could ever make?"
"Oh, he knows how to compliment me all right...in a more physical way." He batted his dark eyelashes a few times and gasped. "Oh, I forgot to ask you. Have you ever tried mutual penetration?"
"With a double-ended dildo?"
"No, with your dick."
I let out a laugh. "You've been watching too much porn, mon chou."
He slid on his white shirt, his voice rising as if this was the announcement of the century: "Enrique and I tried it last night."
"What part of me not fucking for three weeks did you not understand?"
Jean-François went on like I hadn't spoken at all. "It didn't feel all that good, honestly. We had to stop, so I could give him a lap-dance instead. Rode him for forty-five minutes before he came. He made me climax twice."
"I'm happy for you, mon lapin. But you didn't answer my question. He doesn't mind other guys checking you out while you're almost naked out there?"
