"James." I shook my head, knowing I couldn't criticize him for constantly making jokes. I was guilty of exactly the same thing. This reluctance to just fucking flat out tell him I wanted him inside me. "Get the lube."
James lifted an eyebrow and so quickly I almost didn't see it, licked his lips. "I thought you'd never ask." Leaning over to the nightstand again, he threw over his shoulder, "How are you comfortable? I don't --- "
When I rolled onto my front, the mattress shifted under me and he glanced over.
"Ah." He gulped, and I wondered if he'd moved on from nerves to sheer arousal. I sure had. "That answers that question."
I rested my head on folded arms and watched every move he made; unsnapping the lid of the bottle, stroking the lube onto his cock. I even caught the tension in his jaw, the way a nerve twitched when he tried to hold himself back.
"I really don't want to rush this." James moved behind me and I shifted my weight again, moving up onto my knees. Not for the first time our legs tangled as we tried to get comfortable. "But I really do want to as well. That probably makes no sense."
"Makes perfect sense to me," I muttered. "Don't...don't hold back on my account."
"Texas, you don't know what you're saying."
"Yes I..." But words might not get through to him. I wriggled a little instead, moving backwards whenever he touched me.
"Christ. Austin."
The way he said my name, not Texas, not even joking, with not a hint of a smirk to color his tone of voice, made me shudder. Nothing but want in those two syllables.
"Are you sure this is okay?"
"Of course it is." I spoke through gritted teeth, trying not to sound angry, but surrendering to my own desperation. "Just fucking do it, will you?"
His hands were on my hips, holding me steady, or perhaps holding himself steady. His fingertips tightened, making me gasp, and a spark ran up my spine.
When his hands lifted off my skin, I shivered, knowing what was about to happen. What I hoped was about to happen.
But no, not yet.
The lube bottle clicked open and closed behind me again and the shock of a fingertip against my ass made me gasp. Not in discomfort, just with its coldness. "You're deliberately delaying this," I forced out in what was almost a growl.
"Maybe." He eased another finger into me and slid both deeper.
"That wasn't a denial."
"You want me to stop?" He pulled his fingers back and laughed, quietly.
"No. Wait, yes."
"Make up your damn mind, Texas."
I had no idea how to tell him to skip all this nonsense and just get to the main event, so left it to him and those telepathic abilities he'd earlier mentioned.
"Don't want to hurt you, do I?"
"Oh, I don't mind if you..." I screwed my eyes shut, sensed his adrenaline in the split second before he guided the tip of his cock into me, edging forward slowly. I hissed in a breath through gritted teeth, and he froze.
"You okay?"
"Fuck."
"Tex --- Austin? Are you all right?"
"Yeah," I forced out through those still-gritted teeth, then took a deep breath, forcing myself to relax. "Yeah. I am." I gave a quick nod and eased back.
"I didn't hurt you, did I?"
"No. It's just..."
And still he didn't move, waiting for me to explain. To reassure.
"It's just..." I gulped. "God I needed that."
He laughed, under his breath or near enough, with just enough volume to make himself audible. The mattress protested when he shifted his body weight. Moving forward, he slid his cock inside me another inch.
"Should've used more lube. Hold on, I'll get --- "
"No." The sheet bunched under my hands. "No, you're all right. Don't move. I mean move, but..." I laughed just as softly as he had. "Go deeper."
"Jesus," he muttered, sounding like he couldn't believe what he was hearing. But he did exactly as I'd wanted. His every move forward, each advance, though only of an inch or less, made the breath catch in my throat.
"That." The word, and the breath, whooshed out of me.
"Austin?"
"Just. That. Fuck, I'm sorry." I burst out laughing again. "I've forgotten how to speak. I can't make sense."
"Yeah, I know the feeling." His fingertips molded themselves to my hips again and he pushed himself deeper. I thought I heard him murmur something like you're so... but he didn't finish the sentence, merely left his compliment --- I hoped it was to have been a compliment --- hanging in the air between us. He moved so slowly it hurt, but not in the way he was trying to avoid; his self-control made me want him even more.
"God, Jamie, will you stop waiting --- "
"What did you call me?"
"Jamie. James. Whatever. Look, will you just..." I pushed myself back against him, the sudden fullness taking my breath away. Only the tightening of his fingers, the sting of his nails digging into my skin kept me centered in reality. "Just do it. Just fuck me, will you?"
He groaned, and I wondered if I should have been flat on my back.
That way I would have been able to watch him. I wondered if he screwed his eyes shut every time he pulled away then pushed back in. Every stroke made it easier for me to accommodate him. Maybe the first few times he moved inside me had been a bit rough, but that was the way I liked it.
So I had to picture the look on his face, certain he had twin vertical lines between his eyes that deepened with every stroke. His lips I imagined slightly parted, each hitch of breath immediately followed by an exhalation deeper and more desperate than the one before.
"God. Austin," was all he said, and the way he said it made me damn glad he knew my name, even if I didn't know his. Not his real one, anyway.
I could have listened to the way he slowly lost it all night.
The bedsprings protested and every so often the headboard thudded against the plain wallpaper.
"Thank God --- " My speech cut off by a deeper thrust that hit me just right, I had to wait for the feeling to pass. When he moved just so, I couldn't breathe, let alone think.
And he stopped.
"Thank God the bed isn't against your neighbor's wall."
The next sound I heard was that laugh again, and James pushed even deeper. "You like that?"
I could only grunt something incoherent in response and it took him reaching round for me to recover my senses. "No." My hand shot out to his wrist. "Don't."
"You don't want me to touch you?"
"Not there anyway."
James supported himself with both hands on either side of mine, so he could lean over, whisper to me and still be heard. "Why not?"
"Because..." I gulped when he moved again, from the hips. "I don't want to come yet. I want..." I hoped he didn't want any more detail than that; the slow circling of his hips was making my eyes water again. He was all the way inside me and the feeling was so intense it was just this side of painful. Not quite. But exactly the way I liked it.
"I know what you want." His breath warmed the back of my neck --- one advantage of having short hair now --- before lifting away in an instant.
And he didn't speak any more; the only sounds were the mattress adjusting under our collective weight and James's heavy breaths as he got closer and closer.
Definitely. Have him. Fuck You. Face to face. Next time. Even my thoughts punctuated themselves in time with his thrusts.
My blood ran cold for some reason; at first I thought it was the sense James was nearly there, but just as he cried out, shuddered and let himself collapse against me, I knew.
No. Stop it, Austin. You might fuck him tonight --- fair's fair after all --- but this? Him inside you?
There is no next time.
Not after tonight, anyway.
Chapter Six
"I wasn't too rough, was I?" James flopped back onto the bed after getting rid of the condom. Perspiration dusted his forehead, strands of hair at the front mussed with his recent exertion, and I
wished I could have seen him in that moment...
"No. Course not." I lay on my back, the cover pulled up to my waist.
Half hard, my cock didn't ache enough to bother me, but it might soon if he carried on lying there being all naked and sweaty. Maybe I should try meditation. Keep myself centered and in control, I thought. All that omm and shit chanting might work.
I glanced sideways, drank my fill.
Nope. Never gonna happen.
"Good. Thought I might have got carried away."
"If you had, I would have taken it as a compliment."
He smirked, before running the back of his hand over his forehead.
"Jeez, I'm still sweating. I need a stiff one."
"I'd be glad to oblige --- "
"No, not that. Well, I mean, yes that, but I meant a drink." He cleared his throat dramatically as if about to make an important announcement.
"Bring me a flagon of ale, for this night I have been in the midst of Texas!"
"Idiot."
"Should've stopped off in the kitchen on my way back from the bathroom. What about you? Can I get you anything?"
"No, I'm all right, thanks. It wasn't me who did all the hard work there, was it?" And I grinned at his reaction, that now-familiar coloring in his cheeks.
"It wasn't such a chore." He rolled his shoulders as he lifted himself off the bed again and left the room for the second time in five minutes.
He soon returned, carrying a soda can.
"Not beer?" I asked. "Or ale, whatever it was you were yammering on about?"
"I never yammer, I'll have you know. And yes, yes. Not living up to the national stereotype again." He set the can down by his side of the bed and pulled the cover up to his waist, mirroring my lazy posture. "I fail at being Scottish."
"So you thought the land of the free and the home of the brave would be better for you?"
He turned his head on the pillow to look at me, smirking. "Not doing too badly so far, am I?"
"How long have you been here?"
A pause before he answered, as if he was contemplating how much to tell me. Just as I was contemplating how much to ask. "Couple of years."
He shrugged, a mere shoulder twitch, given the fact he was horizontal.
"Near enough."
"And?"
"And what?"
"You're on the run, aren't you? That's why you're so evasive."
"I am so not evasive." His lips curved into a smile, but it didn't quite reach his eyes.
Okay then. Time to stop, Austin.
"I didn't leave the land of the heart attack and the home of the alcoholic under a cloud. Don't fret."
"Uh-huh." A non-committal noise, it could be interpreted as agreement, acknowledgement, a gentle request for elaboration.
"Okay, okay, I admit it. I fucked everyone I could and I got excommunicated for being such a monumental arse-bandit."
"Excommunicated?"
"Extradited. You know. Whatever."
"Look, I'm sorry if I'm being too invasive. It probably seems a bit stupid, asking you shit about your life, you know, when I don't even know your real name. I should shut up now; I'm --- "
"Can I tell you now?"
My mouth went dry. Stupid, stupid, stupid, went round my head. You make no sense, Austin, with this stupid rule of yours. But a desire to try something new, something I'd never done before, didn't have to be labeled "stupid," did it? "Tell me in the morning," I said.
The silence before he replied, though his gaze held mine, seemed eons long. "Okay." The corners of his mouth twitched into the hint of a smile. "Okay." He inhaled sharply, as if about to speak then held it, perhaps thinking again about his words. "It was a man." Pause. "Of course."
I raised my eyebrows. "A man? What was?"
"The reason I came here. A man."
"Oh. Oh. So, you mean like...?"
"A boyfriend. Ex- boyfriend, that is. Things didn't work out."
I took a few seconds to let the information sink in. Of course he'd had lovers before me. There'd be others afterward, too. "I see. So you uprooted yourself for someone? I'm sorry it didn't work out."
"No you're not."
"Pardon?"
"If I'd still been with... him..."
I wondered if he thought the embargo on names applied to everyone connected with him too but it was likely a simple matter of not wanting to talk too much about an ex. Names had power, after all.
"If I'd still been with him, you wouldn't have got a slice of the --- Shit, I nearly said my surname then. I mean, fuck, let me try this again. For the third time, if I'd still been with my ex, you wouldn't have got a slice of my sweet, sweet lovin'."
"And that would have been a tragedy over which I, in my ignorance, would never even have mourned."
"Oh well." James sighed. "It was a bit of an upheaval, but at least I can do my job wherever I am."
"And what is that?" The question seemed natural enough to me, though I still hoped he wouldn't think me too nosy.
"Photography. Freelance. Some portraits. Mostly magazines. Whatever pays the bills."
"So you took the ones hanging in the hall?"
"All my own work. Snapshots, so nothing I'd try to sell. Besides, who'd be interested in old buildings from my home town?"
"You'd be surprised," I said, before biting my lip, wondering if I'd spoken out of turn. I was interested in the sense of walking past the photo frames in the hall on the way to the bedroom, but anything more than that? Why, of course not. "I split up with someone a couple of months back," I blurted out, and wanted to hide as soon as I'd said it. What the fuck was this, an après-sex confessional? Instead, I settled for avoiding his gaze and staring up at the ceiling again.
"Oh?" One syllable, yet more than that. A question.
"Sean Thomas." Names had power, but he deserved none. And some twisted part of me wanted to prove to James, an almost-stranger, that someone with whom I'd been intimate, could be treated casually. My ability to say his name proved my emotional independence. "My grandma always said 'never trust a man with two first names.'"
"So you --- I mean...right. Well. I guess we've both been burned at some point."
"It's just life. Fucks you over for a time, but..."
"You have to get over it and move on." James tapped the cover, drumming his fingers in what could have been impatience, was probably discomfort, maybe a physical prompt for a new line of conversation to spring to mind. "Hey!"
His sudden excitement made me jump.
"Wanna play a game?"
"What sort of game?" Never sign anything until you've read the small print, Lombard.
"It's called 'Mr. Wibbly Hides His Helmet.'" At whatever look he saw on my face then, probably something between shock and hilarity, he waved a hand at me, once. "No, but seriously. That will have to wait until I've recovered. Unless you want to...?" He indicated with a nod --- a distorted one, given his recumbent position --- the patch of duvet below my waist which refused to lie flat for obvious reasons. "Or maybe I should make you wait just a little longer." He shook himself then, a horizontal full-body shrug, and leapt out of bed. "Stay where you are. I'll be right back."
I wasn't too distracted by curiosity over what he was up to now, to fail in grabbing myself an eyeful of his bare ass as he left the room. When he returned seconds later carrying a writing pad and pen, I flinched back into position --- propped up on one elbow, facing him as he joined me in bed again. Inside, I tried to convince myself I hadn't been eagerly anticipating his return, even if the promise of this "game" unsettled me.
"We're going to make a list."
"We are, are we? So lemme get this straight, Jock; you've got a naked nerd in your bed and you want to write your shopping list?"
"No. Well, in a sense I guess you could say that. Your suck-it list. Bucket. I mean...oh fuck it. Wait --- that was it! Your fuck-it list."
"What about it?" I gave a nervous half-laugh, embarrassed now that I'd mentioned it.
"
We're going to write it down."
"Then tick off each item as we go?"
"Depends. How long's the list? It could take longer than one night."
My heart skipped when he said that. I told myself it was adrenaline.
Or something. "If you whittle out all the shit with donkeys and buckets of custard..."
"Yeah, that sort of thing's so passé these days. Come on. Fuck it. What have you never done that you want to do?"
I rolled my shoulders, trying to shrug off the weight of expectation.
"I'm not sure I seriously have anything I've ever thought about, just..."
"Whatever you've already done, except more of it?"
"I guess."
"Bo-ring." James licked the tip of the pen dramatically and screwed his face up into an expression of what I supposed he intended to be contemplation.
"Does sex outdoors count?"
"Ooh, illegal as well, Texas. I like your style. That blow job earlier was just a warm-up, I take it?"
Spoken as if you're going to help me with this list, huh? "Um...God, I can't think --- "
"Rimming."
"You what?"
"Come on. Every gay guy's tried that at least once."
"I haven't. Oh, damn it."
"Ha --- gotcha! It's going on the list. I'll put figging down as well."
"No you won't. The only ginger I want up my ass is Michael Fassbender."
James snorted with laughter. "Don't we all? So. Rimming and figging are out. What about nipple clamps?"
I hissed in a breath.
"That's another no. Gotta tell you, Texas, this list is looking as thin as Victoria Beckham at the moment. You know what you need?"
"I would have thought that was obvious."
"Apart from that. You need some imagination. I mean, where's your spunk --- No, no, for the love of God don't answer that. I'll write this thing down myself."
"What are you --- "
"No, no, don't look." He elbowed me away --- gently so --- and eventually I gave up trying to read whatever he was scribbling.
"It better not be anything too outlandish."
James lowered the notepaper, narrowing his eyes as he looked at me. "Does that mean no baboons or llamas?" He grinned and got back to whatever he was writing. Within seconds he finished up, closed the writing pad and tossed it on the floor beside the bed, near his soda can.
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