The Innocence Series: Complete Bundle

by Riley Knight

  Judah wouldn’t leave him. Even when the man was nowhere near him, even when he was probably on the other side of town, not that Will knew where the man lived, Judah lingered in his mind. It didn’t mean anything, of course, but it was getting a little bit annoying.

  But that was probably just because of Will’s worry, more than anything else. If only Stephen were slightly less interested, but Will didn’t quite have it in him to disappoint his son so thoroughly. Especially since he knew, just as he had known back when he’d first allowed Stephen to join the youth group, that there really wasn’t anywhere better for Stephen to go.

  The question was, what would be better for Stephen. That was all that it came down to, the only thing on his mind, and the only problem with that theory was that he kept thinking about Judah. About the movements of his body, about the way his eyes narrowed slightly and his head tilted to the side when he was thinking about something. Will knew that he was an observant man, but this was a little bit ridiculous.

  With a sigh, Will leaned back and closed his eyes, let his breathing even out a bit. For some reason, it had picked up a little bit. Stress, undoubtedly. Although why stress was making his body feel far too sensitive suddenly, why stress was making him ache in ways that he had denied himself for a long time, he wasn’t quite sure.

  Those eyes. Light blue or dark gray? If only he could put his finger on that, he would be able to stop thinking about their owner. It was just that he didn’t understand Judah, and couldn’t understand him, and was it entirely appropriate for him to be thinking about the minister by his first name, anyway?

  Groaning, Will rested his head against the back of his chair and his hands fell onto his thighs, the nonstop paperwork, the marking which was the bane of every high school teacher’s existence, forgotten for the moment. Something about the way his hands fell, carelessly high up on his thighs, suddenly had his complete attention.

  It was like the movement had given him permission to think about something which he rarely allowed himself to consider. Sexual desire was inevitable, but he did his best to keep it under control until it was appropriate. In his position, it was rarely appropriate, so he ignored it. Simple.

  Only thinking about Judah had made his body seem to melt inside, heat to flow like liquid lava through his veins, into the tiniest little capillary. His heart beat hard as he was achingly aware of his own fingers, far higher up on his thigh than they should be.

  Damn it. Damn Judah. Damn his eyes, his tight body, his lips. Damn him.

  With a groan, Will surrendered to the inevitable. He reached behind him and shut the door to his home office, just in case, giving him the privacy that he needed. With that done, it was the matter of only a few seconds for him to undo his pants, to tug them impatiently open, to reach into his underwear and ease out his erection.

  He was hard. So damn hard, and slick with precome already. It really had been too long, that was all that this was. It wasn’t really because of Judah. He wasn’t doing anything as stereotypical as jerking off while thinking about a hot, deeply forbidden pastor. It had just been so long, and his body was desperate.

  Come for me.

  When Will closed his eyes, he could almost hear that intense voice rasp out the words, could almost see the look that would be in his eyes as he said the words. Okay, so maybe it was a little bit about Judah. The truth was, Will hadn’t been able to stop thinking about what Judah had confided to him, that he was gay.

  Groaning softly, Will allowed his fingers, finally, to wrap around the throbbing length of his dick, and as he did, he imagined that it was Judah. So what? No one would ever have to know, it was just one of those weird things, and later it wouldn’t be so hot to him at all.

  For now, he let himself fantasize. In his imagination, he slid his fingers through soft dark hair, combing through it, as Judah caressed him. Would he know what he was doing? Had he ever touched anyone before? He said that he was gay, but that didn’t say how much experience he had.

  Thinking about that was too good, completely irresistible, and Will had to raise his free hand to his mouth in order to muffle the sound of his moans. His dick twitched in his other hand, seeping precome between his fingers, and there was no way that he was going to be able to last.

  He was right, too. It was only a second or two later that his whole body stiffened and the pleasure, the release, rolled through him like thunder, stealing his breath, his thoughts, as he jerked and moaned into his hand. His hot fluids spilled, not only onto his fingers, but there was so much of it that a few droplets of pearly white even stained his pants.

  Another thing he was right about. Once the madness of lust had passed, once he had given himself release, Judah faded away. It was just that it had been so long, he told himself again, just a little uneasily. That had been a powerful orgasm, and he’d been thinking about Judah the whole time, but it didn’t mean anything.

  Judah was beautiful, the most beautiful man that Will had seen, by far, in a long time. That was the only reason that all of this had affected him as much as it had. The only reason.

  * * *

  It was still on his mind, though, when Will and Stephen walked into the church a few days later. He was going to have to be careful that nothing untoward showed in his gaze when he saw Judah, and it actually helped him to think about how anxious Stephen looked, how awkwardly he shot little glances at his father, as though begging him not to do anything humiliating.

  “Relax, kiddo. I’m just here to watch, for now,” Will tried to assure him, but though Stephen nodded, he wasn’t entirely sure that the teenager was reassured at all. He looked like he’d like to say something, but luckily, Jesse ran up to them then and tugged Stephen off to do whatever it was that fourteen-year-old boys did.

  Sheila, Jesse’s mother, watched with a fond smile on her face as the boys ran off together. She had always seemed to like Stephen, which made perfect sense to Will, but what didn’t make sense to him was how she was always nice to him, too.

  “I’ll see you later,” she chirped at him, then turned and walked away, leaving Will shaking his head. She really did seem nice, and she also seemed to want to be friends, since their kids were so close, but he couldn’t help but be a bit suspicious of her. She was nice because she didn’t know that he was gay. Or there was a good enough chance of it that he didn’t quite want to risk making friends.

  All of this thought, though, was just delaying him, and he knew it. Jesse and Stephen had already disappeared into the church, and Will, slightly amused that he was walking into a church again, followed. Before coming to this town, Will hadn’t been in a church in, well, ten years. It was funny how life worked sometimes.

  “Hey,” Will called out, pleased that his voice was completely normal, that he wasn’t at all distracted by the sight of Judah, who was setting out chairs in the basement, getting ready for the practice. “Do you need any help?”

  Judah looked up, and Will’s stomach gave an awkward little clench. Just when he was congratulating himself on getting over his stupid little crush on Judah, the man had to look at him with those eyes and even shoot him a quick, grateful smile. Getting him out of his system was going to be harder than he’d thought.

  “Yes, please,” Judah told him, and Will grabbed some chairs, helping to set them down into neat rows. “We’re expecting at least twenty. Maybe more, some of the kids said that they might bring friends.”

  Twenty? Judah had gotten twenty teenagers interested in a choir? The man was compelling, but Will was impressed. He didn’t want to be, but it was. He knew well enough how hard it was to interest teenagers in anything.

  As they worked, they moved closer and closer to each other, until they met in the middle of the row. Will found himself closer to Judah than he had been up until this point, just an inch or so away from him. He and Judah were almost the same height, to within a quarter of an inch, but it absurdly pleased Will when he noticed that he was just a hair taller.

  For a moment, the
y just stared at each other, and that moment threatened to spin on and on and out of all control. Finally, Will spoke, because it was speak or go crazy. This close, he could even smell Judah, a surprisingly musky, deeply masculine scent, subtle, but then they were so close together that every breath that Will took brought the scent into his lungs.

  Pheromones. Dangerous, dangerous pheromones.

  “So what’s it like?”

  The truth was, Will hadn’t known what words would come out of his mouth until they were out. He had just known that it was say something or grab Judah, and not only did he have no reason to expect that Judah would want that, but he didn’t want it. Not really.

  “What’s what like?” Judah asked, with one of those deeply endearing little head tilts, as though he were focused entirely on Will, as though he were listening so closely because he didn’t want to miss a word. It was quite the trick, but that’s all it was, a trick, to get people to trust him.

  “Being gay and a minister. A pastor. Whatever you call yourself.” Will was babbling, which was quite unlike him, but Judah didn’t make fun of him for it, which was nice. He just sighed and dropped down into a chair, and after a moment, Will joined him.

  “I don’t really know,” Judah admitted, and Will frowned, confused by that statement. “It’s a different situation for me than it might be for some because no one knows about me. I’m …” His voice died down for a moment, and Judah found himself nearly holding his breath, like he might breathe too loudly and miss whatever Judah was going to say next, which was so far beyond stupid that it wasn’t even funny. “I’m not experienced.”

  Will suddenly didn’t know what to say at all. He barely knew how to breathe. Judah hadn’t gone into details, of course, but to Will, it very much sounded like Judah’s lack of experience might just be complete. Or was that his primitive sex brain finally coming to the forefront, taking control, and giving him fantasies that were nearing pornographic?

  The truth was, it had been erotic enough thinking about Judah. Sitting here, right beside him, listening to him say things which could definitely be dirty, it was a whole new level. If it had been someone else, someone who wasn’t a minister, and if they hadn’t been in a church, Will would have been pretty sure that he was being given some fairly blatant signals to give something a try. It probably would have seemed worth it to take Jonah by his shoulders, to pull him toward him, to kiss him, to see where it all went …

  But that was highly inappropriate, and it made no logical sense whatsoever to go there, which was why it made absolutely no sense for him to do what he did. For him to lean in, just a tiny bit, a slight incline of his body toward Judah. After all, the man might be young, far too young for Will, but he was an adult, and he could push him away if he wanted to.

  Only Judah wasn’t pulling away. Instead, he was watching, as though deeply curious to see what Will was going to do next, and he really, really had no business laying his hands, or anything else, on this man’s body, but then Judah was leaning toward him, and those big, intense eyes were starting to flicker shut …

  It was a good thing that they were in the basement, or else Will wouldn’t have had much warning. As it was, he was nearly so lost in Judah that he didn’t even hear the voices of the large group of laughing teenagers as they came down the stairs.

  In the end, the only thing that saved them from being caught was the loud, thumping sound that they made as they trooped, en masse, down to the basement. In a split second, Judah was gone, and Will was left there and barely able to breathe as he tried desperately to pull himself together.

  He had almost kissed a minister. And what was more, he could swear that said minister had almost kissed him back.

  FIVE

  The kids were going to be able to hear his heart beating right through his ribcage, he was sure of it. People the next county over might be able to hear it, he thought, and he had to avoid Stephen’s eyes when the young man, chattering happily with Jesse and apparently oblivious to the fact that Ruby was watching them with a flirtatious look on her face, came into the room.

  Had Judah really almost done that? Had he really almost kissed a man, and not just any man, but a man that was the father of a person that he very much hoped would be central to one of the many plans that he had for getting this church really, truly going? For having it be the center of town, a place where anyone felt safe?

  The worst part was, it hadn’t just been a momentary lapse. Judah had wanted it, and even as he pulled away from Will, part of him wanted to hook his fingers behind the other man’s neck, to kiss him right there in front of God and the kids and whoever else wanted to watch.

  Impossible, of course. Judah doubted he could make himself do it, but the temptation was there. So there was only one thing for him to do, the one thing that he could always count on. That would be work, and it just so happened that he was working right now, so it should be easy to distract himself.

  Only Judah could swear that he could feel the weight of Will’s eyes on him, making him acutely aware of his own body in a way that he usually wasn’t. He could practically see Will’s face hovering in front of him, distracting him terribly with a slightly teasing look in his eyes, lips slightly parted as he leaned in.

  It was probably nothing. Will had probably not even been about to kiss him. So Judah put it out of his mind, or that was the theory, anyway. In practice, it was a little bit different, and as he faced the rows of kids, he forced his eyes to stay away from Will, who was perched on the edge of one of the couches, just watching. Exactly as arranged.

  It was probably important for him to remember that Will was someone who didn’t like him. And someone who could impact him with that dislike, too, just to make things more complicated.

  “Um, Pastor Judah?” Ruby spoke up, and Judah turned his attention back to the throng of kids. And a throng it was. There were, Judah realized upon doing a quick headcount, twenty-five children between the ages of about ten to Stephen, who was fourteen. He hadn’t expected this sort of turnout, not in the slightest.

  “Yes, Ruby?” Judah was pretty glad to hear that his voice didn’t shake when he spoke. Maybe this wasn’t getting to him as much as he thought it was, or so he thought until he caught his eyes going back over toward Will. Always toward Will, some force pulling him back in a way that Judah could no more resist, it seemed, than he could resist the urge to breathe.

  Was this what desire, what lust, what attraction, really felt like? He had felt whispers of this, mere inklings, but never anything that took control of him to this level. When Will was around, Judah was aware of him. It wasn’t anything he could control.

  “I don’t understand my part …”

  Or, more likely, Ruby wanted to draw attention back to herself. A certain young musical prodigy wasn’t paying attention to her, had his nose buried in his sheet music, which Judah had just handed out.

  Still, it wasn’t a bad idea, and Judah nodded to her.

  “I’ll demonstrate.” And he did, singing the simple, pretty melody. “That’s the soprano part, but I’ll use it to figure out what parts all of you should be singing.”

  There. That was a little bit better, pulling him out of his daze and into something far more useful. And yet, now and then, despite his best efforts, his gaze would slip back to Will, and he would have to draw them back with a force of pure will.

  The more the practice went on, the more he found himself looking, and what made it so much more difficult was that Will was usually looking right back at him. Maybe it was just that Will was still distrustful of him, still contemplating taking Stephen away.

  Somehow, Judah didn’t think so. Not when he remembered how close they had come to kissing. He might not know very much about this sort of thing, so he couldn’t be completely sure, but he knew what it had felt like.

  It seemed to take forever, and Judah wanted it to be over. Or he never wanted it to be over. He honestly wasn’t sure which. But time carried on regardless of which one
it was, and soon enough, parents were coming to pick up their kids and Judah was wrapped in a swarm of adults, all of whom were congratulating him on this idea. A choir, he was assured over and over again, was exactly what this town needed.

  “We need to get you married and settled down here,” one woman said, and while no one else was bold enough to say those words out loud, there were quite a few nods of approval to her suggestion.

  Married. And probably to a woman, because he was fairly certain nothing else would be accepted. A little of the golden shimmer which had seemed to settle over the whole evening died away then, and it was a relief when they all filed out.

  Will was the last to go, and he gave Judah a bit of a look before sighing, resignation in his gaze.

  “I’m going to regret this,” he said, and despite his words and that sigh, there seemed to be a hint of something flirtatious in his voice. Maybe? “But Stephen can stay.”

  So that was something, anyway. But he still couldn’t help but look at Will with helpless longing as the man and his talented son walked out of the church basement.

  * * *

  Out of the church basement, maybe, but not out of his mind. Later that night, in the tiny apartment which was still filled with a few boxes that he hadn’t even had time to unpack yet, Will came back into his mind’s eye with a vengeance.

  Not the Will who had snarled at him and had tried his best to pick a fight, nor even the Will who was a single father, determined to take care of his son at whatever cost. It was a Will that Judah had only seen glimpses of, a Will who looked at him with approval and desire in his big hazel eyes, a Will who smiled seductively at him as he slipped off his clothes …

  Judah was lying in bed, but he sat up with a start when his mind started to go there. With a soft, annoyed growl, he flung himself out from under the covers and stalked off to the bathroom, where he turned the shower on hot and strong. Maybe he could burn this out of himself, this forbidden desire.