by Erin McRae
“I am suffering here,” Aaron breathed out, still with all that lovely laughter.
“Is that a problem?” Zack asked.
“No.”
“Good. Then keep suffering.”
Aaron moaned and dropped his head back against the bedpost. And Zack used the moment—so perfect, so hot—to pull out of his own clothes.
Naked, he stood next to the bed, and waited for Aaron’s eyes to open and focus on his body. He watched as they tracked up and down him, lingering and returning, lingering over and returning to his tattooed arms and his thickening dick.
“See something you like?” Zack asked.
“So much,” Aaron said. “You’re ridiculous, but so much. Are you going to give me any of it?”
“What’s going to make it the most agonizing for you,” Zack asked, “if I don’t let your cock out?”
“Fuck my mouth?” Aaron asked in a small eager voice.
Zack wasn’t going to make him beg today, but he would bet anything that he could make Aaron beg and love every second of it.
He fisted himself in himself in his hand and gave himself several sharp tugs before holding his dick out to Aaron barely an inch from his face.
“If you want it,” he said, “you have to stretch for it.”
Aaron did, leaning forward and stretching his neck out the best he could with his arms still trapped in his shirt and bound to the bedpost.
“That’s it,” Zack cooed as Aaron flicked his tongue over the head of his dick. This was, he knew, going to be amazing.
“That’s it, that’s a good boy,” he said as Aaron got his lips wrapped around the head. “Now let me feed it to you, nice and slow.”
Aaron whined back in his throat and shifted and squirmed on the bed. Zack forced himself to keep his eyes open to see Aaron thrusting up into the air, desperately trying to get friction against his jeans.
“You don’t come until I’m done,” he said.
Aaron, his mouth full, nodded in agreement, and made a small noise of assent.
Zack gripped the back of his head and started to thrust gently.
“Close your eyes,” he said. “Trust me. I don’t want you to think or feel or be anything else right now.”
Aaron moaned and Zack nearly did too as he felt the other man slip under the spell of a moment he was determined to drag out as long as possible.
After Zack came, panting and having to shove a hand over his own mouth to make sure he wasn’t heard in Marie’s house above, he let himself linger in Aaron’s mouth. It was overwhelming, almost too much, but Aaron’s soft whimpers as he tried to hold onto Zack’s dick with his lips while he made shallow circles with his hips on the bed were hard to let go of.
Eventually, Zack let himself slide out of Aaron’s slick mouth. He watched as the man took three sharp, shallow breaths, his lips glistening with what they had done.
“Please,” Aaron said like a prayer, his eyes still closed.
Zack crashed to his knees to get Aaron’s jeans open, his dick popping free.
“Please please please,” Aaron started begging now, eyes pressed shut so tight.
“Can you be quiet?” Zack asked. He doubted this apartment was any type of sound proof.
Aaron shook his head frantically.
“Then can I put my hand over your mouth?” Zack asked.
“Yes,” Aaron said. Zack clamped his hand there. Aaron pressed up into it, as if he liked that confinement as well.
As Zack took Aaron’s cock into his mouth down to the root, he felt the vibrations of Aaron’s cries against his palm. He wanted to keep them forever.
Chapter 11
THE NEXT MORNING
Zack’s Bed
AARON WOKE UP AS LIGHT was starting to show outside the small, curtained windows that hovered close to street level. He lay still, cocooned in blankets and pressed against Zack’s side, resolved not to move until he had to. Any morning he didn’t have to rush out the door to the rink was a good morning. A day he got to stay in bed, warm and blissfully comfortable, with the person he’d just had some pretty incredible sex with...that was sublime. He eventually fell asleep again, lulled by the sound of rain drumming on the windows and Zack’s quiet breathing.
He was pulled back to consciousness an indeterminate amount of time later by Zack’s voice.
“You’re stealing the blankets,” Zack complained, tugging at the duvet that, somehow, Aaron had completely burritoed himself in.
Aaron mumbled his displeasure at the disturbance and rolled toward the nearest source of warmth, taking his blankets with him.
“Okay, now you’re on top of me and still stole all the blankets. How did you do that?” Zack sounded equal parts dismayed and amused.
“I’m cold,” Aaron mumbled into a bare patch of Zack’s skin that might have been his shoulder.
The warm lump that was Zack shifted, and he wrapped his arms around Aaron’s shoulders. Aaron snuggled further into the embrace. “You’re never cold,” Zack protested.
“Rink cold is different,” Aaron said.
Zack laughed softly. “I don’t think that’s true, but okay.”
Aaron blinked sleep out of his eyes and peered down at Zack. His eyes were very pretty from this close. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Zack brushed a stray bit of hair off Aaron’s face. The touch sent goosebumps sparking down his arms. He was tempted—strongly—to lean down and kiss Zack and continue where they’d left off last night. But the more he woke up, the more nervy and uncertain he felt. Aaron had done enough mornings-after following hookups of varying degrees of wisdom that he had been sure he knew how to handle any variation. But right now, he was at a loss.
“I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do now,” Aaron blurted.
“If you wanted to share the blankets, I wouldn’t mind,” Zack said, evidently amused.
“Ugh.” Aaron protested for the form of it. He shuffled himself around until his head was on Zack’s shoulder and the covers were reasonably distributed over both of them.
“Why ugh?” Zack asked once they were settled again, his arms wrapped comfortably around Aaron.
“This—you—are very pleasant, but....” Aaron squirmed with uncertainty.
“But what?”
“I’ve never done anything like what we did last night. And now I am kind of at a loss.”
“Really?” Zack teased. “You seemed like a natural.”
Aaron shoved at him with a laugh. “Thank you and that’s not what I meant.”
“Fair. Sorry. But that’s not uncommon,” Zack said. His matter-of-factness made some of Aaron’s nerviness dissipate. At least one of them knew what they were doing. “What do you need?”
“I don’t know,” Aaron said. “Which I think is part of the problem? I always know what I need. At least in training. And sex is usually straightforward.”
“But last night wasn’t?” Zack asked.
“Not in the least.” Aaron shook his head.
Zack’s forehead creased. “Did you not like it?”
“No! No no no no. I liked it. I liked it a lot,” Aaron said emphatically.
“Oh, okay. Good then.” Zack sounded relieved. He tightened his arms around Aaron. “I liked it too. in case that wasn’t clear at the time.”
“I just...” Aaron searched for words. “I don’t know what to think about it.”
“If it helps, you don’t have to think anything about it.”
“I know, but.” Aaron floundered for the right words. “I’m a competitive athlete. I like structure. I’m wired to like meeting expectations, or maybe, I’ve wired myself to like meeting expectations. Which is probably why that worked for me the way it did. But you saying there’s nothing I have to do—I get that you’re being generous. But it’s not helping right now.”
Zack narrowed his eyes, evidently considering. When he spoke again, his voice was lower. Warmer, with a hush that promised good things to Aaron if he listened and listened closely.
Aaron nodded.
“Easy enough. Especially for you.” Zack drew his nose along the line of Aaron’s jaw, from his mouth to his ear. “You are good. You are very good. Especially for me. Whatever you want me to say—or do—to prove that to you, I am more than happy to oblige. And if you don’t know what that might be....” he trailed off, and pulled back enough to give Aaron a wicked grin.
Aaron shook his head, his eyes wide. He wanted another chance to feel amazing as much as he wanted another chance to not think at all.
“Do you want me to get you off again?” Zack asked.
“Yes,” Aaron said. “But—”
“But? I am many things,” Zack replied, “But definitely a crappy mind-reader.”
“I want to focus on you first,” he said. “Like last night.”
“Ohhhhh,” Zack said, looking beyond delighted. “Then why don’t you come down here,” he said, holding the blankets up for Aaron. “And warm my cock. Just hold it in your perfect mouth.”
Aaron scrambled under the covers into the heat and warmth and musk of being so close to Zack’s body like this.
“That’s it,” Zack crooned above him. “Don’t do anything. Just breathe,” he said as he stroked Aaron’s hair. “Let me take my time getting hard. When I want to make use of you I will.”
It was so filthy and hot Aaron thought he would combust on the spot, but he did as he was told, enjoying the heavy weight of Zack in his mouth and the idea that he could be this incredibly good—and be rewarded for it—by doing almost nothing at all.
AARON GOT READY TO leave Zack’s apartment reluctantly, and only because he had ice time that afternoon. He felt giddy, tired, and remarkably clear-headed, like he suddenly knew what silence was for the very first time in his life.
“When we do this again,” Zack told him, pressing him back against the door and sucking a bite just below the collar of Aaron’s shirt. “Bring your skating stuff here and save yourself a trip.”
So much for the quiet in his head.
Aaron was dizzy with desire on the drive home. Nothing but years of discipline kept him from turning around and diving right back into Zack’s bed with him. He needed to snap out of it, but he didn’t want to.
Focus, he told himself, twiddling the radio dial to find a suitably high-energy station to get into the right mode. You have work now. Be boy crazy on your own time.
Which was always easier said than done. And Zack seemed to make it particularly difficult.
He unlocked the door to his own apartment to find Charlotte perched on the couch, her computer on her lap and a half-empty smoothie bottle on the coffee table.
“Where have you been?” she demanded as soon as he came in.
“I told you I was going to Zack’s.”
“All night?” She narrowed her eyes at him.
“I mean, demonstrably, yes?”
Charlotte sniffed. “You might have come to your senses and gone to the gym this morning instead. You have ice time at two and an Olympic team to make. He can’t be that good.”
“I can keep my own schedule,” Aaron pointed out. There were ways in which he was a mess, but blow off his obligations, he did not.
“When is he leaving? His article must be nearly done.” Charlotte quite clearly wanted him gone. Which Aaron could accept to some extent as the care of a concerned roommate and a fellow skater who didn’t want the distraction in the rink, but it struck him as a little extreme.
“It is,” Aaron said. “But he’s not. At least for now. He’s staying on to do some work of his own. Or something. I’m not positive he’s sure what.”
Charlotte’s mouth opened in dismay. “In Marie’s basement?”
Aaron dropped down beside her on the couch. “It’s a good basement!”
“The basement is not the point!”
“Okay, what is the point?” he asked, squinting at her. Zack’s presence at TCI had never thrilled Charlotte, but she’d never been this abrasive about him before. “What’s wrong?”
"Has Marie googled him? Have you googled him?" she demanded.
"I read one of the war book reviews, but you know, I’m a little busy here." He squinted at her. “Why?”
"You have questionable taste in men, even more questionable judgment, and no research skills. All the good google stuff is always two or three pages down."
"What did you find?" Aaron asked, curious. "His high school Myspace page or something?"
"No. Not that. Here." Charlotte shoved her laptop at him.
Aaron didn’t have that much time before he needed to get back out the door and to the rink, but he took it with trepidation. What was he about to find? Was Zack not really divorced?
“See?” she said.
Aaron didn’t at first. He squinted, trying to make out the subject of a series of black-and-white photos on the screen. The reflection from the window behind them made it hard, and he reached behind himself with one hand to tug the shade closed.
Ah. Discussing erotica photography with Charlotte wasn’t how he expected his afternoon was going to go.
“That is a very attractive mostly naked man, but—”
Charlotte huffed and yanked the computer back into her lap, gesturing at the screen. “Do ropes count as clothes? I think he’s just naked.”
Aaron didn’t feel prepared to get into that particular philosophical conversation at this particular moment as his brain tried to catch up to why they were having this conversation at all. “But that’s not Zack. What do these have to do with anything?”
He realized the likely answer only as the words flew out of his mouth. Zack had a very nice camera, a photography hobby he was super vague about, and he’d hooked Aaron’s arm over the bedpost and put him on display within moments of their agreeing to have sex. Oh.
Somehow over the screeching of metaphorical brakes in his own head, he heard Charlotte make a noise of disgust that sounded like all the consonants in the English alphabet exhaled in one single breath of supreme annoyance.
“He’s the photographer, Aaron.”
“Of course he is,” he said softly.
Aaron yanked the laptop back from her and did some more squinting at the sun-obscured screen. He was still fascinated, but not just because of how hot the pictures were. Who was the guy in them? A random model? Zack’s ex? They’d had sex last night—and again this morning less than two hours ago. These photos were as intimate as those moments, no matter how artful. He felt adrift again.
Zack’s past didn’t matter, and neither, really did the photos. Certainly, Aaron had no moral objection to them. But he was a public person who hated that reality of the sport. Zack had helped him feel okay and contained in his own skin again, but Zack could, just as easily, ask to expose him like this. Aaron didn’t know how to reconcile that.
“Oh,” he said again because he didn’t know what else to say. “You should have told me what I was looking for, otherwise I’m gonna look at—”
“I know!” Charlotte gave him a glare illustrative of her done-ness with the entire masculine portion of the species.
Aaron angled the laptop to get a better look. Patterns of ropes and knots danced over skin as surely as shadow and light. They were, truly, beautiful photographs, even if they were also complicating his life immeasurably. The ropes were something he wanted, but now Zack’s camera, idle on a table, felt wildly dangerous.
“He’s good,” he said, because it was true and simpler than the rest of it.
Charlotte’s murder eyes could have rivalled Katie’s at their best. “That’s your reaction!”
“What else am I supposed to say?” Other than Zack is very good at getting people to do what he wants.
Aside from the somersaults his brain was doing—talk about information overload—he couldn’t track Charlotte’s dismay. She was never bothered by displays of the sensual or explicit and was often very vocal about her impatience with puritanical
American prudishness.
“You want to make Team USA, and yet you’re sleeping with a journalist who also ties people up and takes pictures of them and puts those pictures on the internet! I don’t know, Aaron, that seems like a bad plan!”
“They’re not pictures of me,” he protested. Though now that Charlotte put it that way, his own concerns had coalesced to a bright, vivid point.
“Are you being dense on purpose?”
“No! I get what you’re saying. I just don’t get why it matters.” That was true. He didn’t want this to be an issue, and he was angry that it already felt like one.
“In an Olympic year, everything matters.”
Charlotte wasn’t wrong. But life at Twin Cities Ice was never as regimented as it was at some of the other training centers. Yes, food and sleep and training regimens were tracked rigorously in ways that were intrusive, exhausting, and not always fun. Unlike a lot of athletes elsewhere, Aaron got to eat dessert once a week, but that was seen as a wild, unorthodox risk. Olympic years were hard. Brutal, even. But Brendan and Katie were constantly telling him that he couldn’t only be a skater, he had to be a person too. Otherwise no one would care about what he did on the ice, not even himself.
But what if everything includes my body feeling something other than constant pain and my heart feeling something other than desperate fear that I won’t pull this off?
If Zack untethered Aaron, he also anchored him again and made him feel like a person in his own skin. Now that he’d had a taste of that, Aaron didn’t want to give it up.
THE PROBLEM WITH DISCOVERING the guy he had been crushing on for ages and who he’d finally slept with last night wasn’t just kind of into bondage but was a world-renowned bondage photographer in his spare time was that it was, as far as the facts went, kind of distracting.
He lost complete track of time scrolling through the photos—there were a lot of them, with a variety of models—and arguing with Charlotte about how bad an idea dating Zack was. He ended up grabbing his skating stuff in a rush, bolting to the car, and sticking to the speed limit only because he knew Katie would kill him more for getting a speeding ticket than for being late. He ran into the rink, sparing only a wave for Cal at the front desk, and dropped himself onto the benches closest to the ice as the giant clock ticked over to the top of the hour.
