Learned Reactions

by Jayce Ellis

  “Jesus Christ.” Deion planted his feet on the bed and widened his stance, giving Carlton full access to his body.

  Carlton drew his sac into his mouth, rolling his tongue over it before sucking gently. Because Deion rarely got head, he rarely got the rest either, and the feel of Carlton’s mouth pushed him perilously close to the edge sooner than he expected.

  He reached down to stroke his dick, but Carlton popped his hand. “Mine,” he said before turning to Deion’s balls, rolling and sucking and wetting them as though he couldn’t get enough. Deion fisted the sheets, the muscles in his arms and shoulders growing tight as the energy it took not to reach down and bring himself to climax reached a near boiling point.

  For years he’d fantasized about Carlton, what it would be like to have him. These weeks had blown his imagination out of the water. Carlton loved taking him to the brink of orgasm before bringing him back, loved seeing Deion at his mercy, begging for his touch. He made sure Deion knew, in no uncertain terms, there was no pity in this fucking. Carlton truly wanted him. Maybe not all of him, but his body? Carlton was all over his body.

  Now Carlton released him, running his tongue up the underside of the head, flicking at the tip before opening his mouth around it. Deion nearly shot off the bed, yanking so hard he pulled the fitted sheet from one corner of the mattress. Carlton couldn’t take him all in, almost no man could, but he used his hand and pulled up toward the base while he sucked down. With his other hand, he rolled Deion’s balls, still sensitive from his earlier ministrations.

  Deion almost didn’t know what to do. It had been so long since someone had played with his body this way, he was like an untried youth. Carlton popped off, and Deion swallowed the whine a bubbling up in his throat. Carlton pointed two fingers at him. “Suck.”

  Oh God. Deion’s eyes rolled back but he did as he was told, swirling his tongue around Carlton’s fingers, knowing where this was headed and needing it more than he could possibly express. When Carlton removed them, he leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to Deion’s lips. “Fuck my face, Deion. Fuck it the way I know you’ve always wanted to.”

  A full-body shudder rippled through him, and Carlton winked before resuming his position. He swallowed Deion again, grabbed his hand, and placed it on the back of his head. And then he looked at him.

  From here, with Carlton looking up at him while Deion’s dick stretched his mouth wide open, Deion could see every expression on his friend’s face. Need, desire...love?

  Deion gripped Carlton’s head, and watched as his eyes fluttered closed and he moaned. Then he moved a finger past Deion’s balls, circling his taint, then finding its way unerringly to Deion’s hole. He massaged it with one finger, then slid in.

  “Fuck.” The word tore long and low from Deion’s throat, and he pumped into Carlton’s mouth. Carlton added a second finger, then crooked his fingers, nudging his prostate. And Deion let go of the one hand still gripping the sheets. He held on to Carlton’s head with both hands, pumping his hips up and forcing his way into Carlton’s mouth, while Carlton finger-fucked him and continued to graze over Deion’s prostate. He came with a hoarse yell, fucking Carlton through it, Carlton’s fingers unceasing.

  When he finally relaxed, releasing Carlton’s head and flopping loosely against the mattress, Carlton removed his fingers. He crawled up the bed to straddle Deion’s chest and jerked himself off in front of Deion’s face. The sound alone was enough to make Deion’s dick twitch again, then Carlton stiffened and shot his load all over Deion’s face. When he was done, he dragged his dick through his come, then fed it, bit by bit, into Deion’s mouth. It was as much like marking him as the bites in the shower had been, and he loved it. He absolutely, one hundred percent, loved every moment of it.

  Carlton shuffled down the bed until they were face-to-face, then licked Deion’s face clean before plunging his tongue in Deion’s mouth. They kissed like that for what seemed like forever, Deion wrapping the leg around his best friend, making out like teenagers. And if he could stay this way forever, that sounded like a damn good idea.

  * * *

  Carlton had to give it to Lawrence. When he’d called to schedule an impromptu appointment to discuss therapy, the receptionist had told him in no uncertain terms that Lawrence was in the middle of a very important negotiation and wouldn’t be available for at least three days. She’d called back less than an hour later to inform him Lawrence could meet him at eleven.

  His nerves had weakened when she’d told him Lawrence was unavailable, and ratcheted up when she’d called back. Now he sat in the lobby, trying desperately to control his bouncing knee and racing heart. He wasn’t sure how successful he was.

  “Mr. Monroe?” The voice was deep and familiar and way too formal, and Carlton turned to find Lawrence in the doorway, a remarkably blank expression on his face.

  He hopped up, banging his knee against the coffee table laden with magazines, and Lawrence narrowed his eyes. Carlton was about to hear it. He muttered a quick thank you to the receptionist, who gave him a slight nod before turning back to whatever she was doing, then walked to the door Lawrence was holding open.

  Lawrence didn’t say anything on the way back to his office, or when Carlton took a seat. In fact, Lawrence stayed outside, talking to his secretary, for almost five minutes before coming in. Five minutes of Carlton trying, and failing, to calm himself. To berate himself for not understanding, not recognizing, that Ollie needed more help than he’d given her. What kind of parent missed that? She was struggling, with her parents’ death and her impetuous decision to leave her grandparents, with the commute to the school and wrestling practice and those assholes—sure, they were kids, but they were assholes—who were messing with his kid.

  The door shut, and Carlton jumped. To his overworked mind, it was like a clap of thunder, but in reality was probably a soft click.

  “You look like shit,” Lawrence said, his voice low.

  “Why are you whispering?”

  “You don’t look like you can handle normal volumes right now.” Lawrence reached out with a bottle of water, which Carlton grabbed like a lifeline and guzzled.

  A few deep breaths later, he sat back in his seat. “I’m fucking this whole thing up and I don’t know what to do.”

  “Talk to me, Carlton. Tell me what’s going on.”

  He nodded. “I know you got shit to do. I’ll try to be quick about it.”

  Lawrence waved him off. “You wouldn’t have called if something hadn’t happened.” He stood, shucked his jacket, and sat in the remaining guest chair. “I’m your friend first. Talk to me. What’s going on?”

  Carlton cracked a smile, grateful that his impulsive behavior the day Trey had started Howard had led to not one, but two, true friends. He pointed to the chair. “You sure you want to sit here? These ain’t the most comfortable seats.”

  “That’s intentional,” Lawrence said with a wink. “Keeps people from sticking around and wasting my time. Meeting billable hours is a bitch. And you’re stalling again.”

  Couldn’t get away with a damn thing. “Olivia needs counseling,” he blurted out.

  Lawrence inhaled deeply and whistled out. “I suppose that’s not too surprising under the circumstances. You need some referrals?”

  “Yeah, that’s what I was initially calling about.”

  “But that’s not the only thing bugging you.” A statement, not a question. “You could’ve gotten a list from my secretary. What else is going on?”

  Carlton groaned and sank farther in his chair. “How’d I miss it? How’d I not see that she needed help? What kind of parent am I to not notice this?”

  “Carlton,” Lawrence said softly, and waited until Carlton rolled his head to look at him. “You’re beating yourself up for no reason. I know,” he said, holding a hand up to cut off whatever Carlton’d been about to say, “you want to be perfect. Do eve
rything exactly how it needs to be done. But the world doesn’t work that way, and parenting damn sure doesn’t. You know how many fights we have with clients who don’t want to get their kids counseling for whatever asinine reason, and we have to push them? And these are parents who birthed them. How long have you had Olivia?”

  “A month,” he muttered. “But—”

  “But nothing. Not even a full damn month. You’re another change on top of a million she’s had to deal with. You’re bound to fuck up. The point is that you’re rectifying it now.” Carlton nodded, and Lawrence’s eyes narrowed. “How’re things with Deion?”

  Fuck. He’d known he wouldn’t be able to escape this part of the conversation. Hell, maybe some part of him wanted to have it, else Lawrence was right: he could’ve called and had something emailed to him. What he really needed was a friend.

  Carlton shifted in the seat, leaning with his elbows on his knees. “I don’t know what to do with him. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. It’s like...” He trailed off, not sure how to best explain it. Lawrence waited patiently by his side, until Carlton snorted. “It’s like we’re closer physically and further apart on everything else.”

  Lawrence stared at him for a beat, and his brow rose slowly but surely up to his hairline. He sat back, straightened his legs and crossed them at the ankles, and steepled his fingers. Carlton was scared. “So y’all are fucking? Doing the one thing I’m pretty sure I explicitly told you not to do?”

  How in the hell had he forgotten Lawrence didn’t know? That he’d somehow managed to keep that information from him? There was no choice but to be honest about it now.

  “We’d fucked before you told me not to.”

  “I don’t even know why I’m surprised.” He paused, then huffed. “Y’all are just...full-on playing house, huh?” The tiniest hint of humor laced his voice.

  “Is that normal home life? Fucking regularly but not communicating?”

  Lawrence shook his head. “Nah. Normally you don’t get laid either. Anyway,” he continued, before Carlton could shift the conversation to Lawrence’s home life like he wanted, “how the hell did that happen? Not the fucking—that I don’t want to know. But the breakdown.”

  That was the thing. He had no idea. If anything, he’d thought that shift in the relationship from friends to...more would bring them closer. But he was constantly on edge now, and he couldn’t pinpoint why. Ever since he’d told Deion about the counseling, he’d retreated, and Carlton didn’t know how to bridge the unspoken gap between them.

  “Okay, real talk.” Lawrence stood and cracked his back before retaking his seat behind the desk. “Sorry, man, I’m too old to be that uncomfortable.” Carlton laughed and shifted himself. Lawrence needed some friend chairs to go with his client ones. “Fucking doesn’t solve problems. It just creates new ones. I know you know this.”

  Carlton grunted. “Yeah, I know.”

  “And I’d bet an amount of money that matters y’all haven’t discussed what you want from each other, either for while he’s here or what happens when he leaves.”

  Another grunt. “You’d be right.”

  “Why? What are you afraid of?”

  His shoulders sank. “Everything, man. Screwing up with Olivia and losing her. Screwing up with Deion and losing him. I don’t know why they chose me in the first place, and I damn sure don’t know how to keep them.” That was a lot of verbal diarrhea and he wanted a Time Stone to call all those words back.

  Lawrence tilted his head. “What are you talking about? Why they chose you? Your ain’t-shit parents are probably no better with Trey and Olivia than they were with you. Shit, you don’t think there’s a reason your sister got married early? Got the hell out the house what, two years after you left?” He braced his elbows on the desk. “I’m not good at soothing people. Ask my ex, or my kids. But man, our parents not being terrible doesn’t mean they were great, and yours were clearly on the not-great spectrum. You are not. You care about these kids. You want what’s best. That’s a fuck of a lot more than a lot of kids get.”

  Carlton rolled his lips in, trying to stave off the tears that threatened. He’d been on the verge of tears more in the past month than at any time since Carrie’s funeral, and before then, since that phone call from his parents. He was honestly tired of it. But somehow, it’d never occurred to him that his parents’ behavior hadn’t been negative just toward him. That Carrie, Trey, and Olivia had been subjected to it, and had all escaped. That Trey and Olivia had known he’d do his best, even if it wasn’t perfect and he’d screw up. And his friends would help guide him when that inevitably happened.

  Which brought him back around to Deion. “What the hell do I do about Deion, Lawrence? I can’t... He loves his parents. He talks to them every week. He’s still planning to move there, for fuck’s sake.” Carlton jumped out the chair and paced, tugging at his scalp before facing Lawrence again. “There’s no way I can ask him to give that up.”

  Lawrence considered him for a moment before gesturing to the seat. Carlton stiffened, wanting to decline for no other reason than he didn’t want to be told what to do, before shaking his head and sitting. He was losing his mind.

  “You ever stop and think Deion is doing exactly what he wants to do? That he’s weighed the pros and cons, and what he wants is you? And Olivia? And shit, even your nephew?”

  Only in his wildest dreams. Even when he remembered Deion’s drunken words his first night here, loving Carlton didn’t mean wanting to jump into a full-fledged family. It didn’t matter Deion was doing exactly that right now.

  Because there was no guarantee he’d stay. He’d never said he intended to, and Carlton hadn’t had the guts to ask. Which was some shit he should’ve been over a decade ago, but damn. They’d talked about everything except each other, and Carlton didn’t know what to do.

  Someone knocked on the door, then Gwen Chang poked her head in. She looked at Carlton for a moment before she said, “You look like Mr. Jackson just said he’s gonna charge you for this visit or something.”

  Carlton laughed, which turned into a cough, which turned into Lawrence circling the desk to rub his back. “You okay there?”

  He managed to nod and Gwen smiled. “Sorry to interrupt, but these guys are no longer listening to me, Mr. Jackson. I need your assistance.”

  “Be there in a sec,” Lawrence said, and with a small wave, Gwen left. “Duty calls,” he said to Carlton, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair, “but don’t think I missed how you didn’t answer the question. And shit, you don’t have to tell me, but you need to answer it for yourself or, better yet, ask him. What if he’s made up his mind, and you, and this, are what he wants?”

  Carlton’s sigh was the most he could give right now. He followed Lawrence to the front, glad one item had been checked off his list, but more confused than before about everything else.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “Do you know where your uncle is?” Deion asked Olivia.

  She glanced up from the biology book she was hovering over at the kitchen table and shook her head before returning to her work.

  She’d been off the past few days, ever since that run-in at the mall. Even though she’d been clearly happy about the way her room had turned out, with its brand-new headboard, rich duvet cover, and a ton of decorative pillows, and her desk in the corner with special lighting, her excitement had worn off quickly.

  That worried Deion, for a couple of reasons. One, he hated seeing her like this. Two, he didn’t know what to do. Did he address the situation with her? Did he gradually withdraw now and let Carlton take over? He’d thought he knew what his role was, but the longer things went on, the more involved he got, the less sure he became.

  But he couldn’t stand seeing her so unhappy. He pulled up a chair and sank down next to her. “Want to talk about it?”

  She sighed and sat b
ack. “There’s a couple kids at school that just, I don’t know, bother me.”

  “Any of them the same as we saw on Saturday?”

  “Only one. Not Devon,” she added, “but one of the little girls that was with him.”

  “They bullying you?”

  She shrugged, not that he was surprised. He couldn’t remember a kid ever actually using the word bully to describe how they were being treated. But it was clear the teasing hadn’t ceased.

  “What’s she saying?”

  She sighed. “Oh, the usual. That she hopes I like girls, because I turn every guy around me gay. That sort of thing.”

  Well, that was one he hadn’t heard before. “How do you feel when they say that?”

  “That they’re stupid. But everyone laughs, and I clap back at her and she gets in her feelings, and the teacher turns around and I’m the one who gets in trouble.”

  Which was fucking ridiculous. And despite the nonchalant way she spoke, Deion could see how the words bothered her. They crawled under her skin and sat there, taunting her even after the moment had passed, and he recognized it. Because her uncle was the same way. Always pretending nothing bothered him, disregarding any notion he might be anything other than A-OK. Deion already knew how this would go. Olivia would play it cool, time and time again, and then she’d haul off and knock somebody’s lights out, like she’d come close to doing Saturday. And folks would act like they hadn’t seen it coming.

  Evangelyn was right. Therapy was a must.

  He opened his mouth, intent on asking her how she felt about the idea, when the door opened and Carlton walked in. They both stared at the door, watching while Carlton kicked off his shoes, fished his wallet and keys out of his pockets and set them in the bowl Deion had provided, then shrugged out of his suit jacket and hung it up in the front closet.