by Kate Meader
Cade looked to be having a hard time catching his breath. They were on the cusp of something here, a sea change, and Dante could leave it be, play the isolationist as usual, or he could help this man who was clearly hurting.
“Tell me, tesoro. Tell me what’s going on.”
Treasure. Cade had looked it up and that’s what tesoro meant—and that’s how his heart interpreted it. But this was not their usual dynamic. Dante listened but rarely played at Dr. Phil, and Cade didn’t want him thinking he had to ask just because Cade had turned on the sad eyes.
He redirected to the sink and rinsed the razor. Again. “Maybe I should head out.”
“No way.” Dante pushed gently on Cade’s shoulder so they faced each other. “I told you before. I’m here to listen. I meant that.”
Cade crossed his arms over his chest and rested against the vanity. Just do it.
“So one day my mom got a call from the school because of an incident. With me. Expressing myself inappropriately.”
Not so much as an eyelash flutter from Dante. “Okay.”
“I was in the fifth grade and I had this major thing for Johnny Sanderson. He was the most popular kid in class, which was weird because he wasn’t even all that funny. Not like me. I was fucking hilarious. But he had this way about him, even at the age of eleven.”
“Girls wanted him. Boys wanted to be him.”
“Yeah. But this boy, yours truly, didn’t want to be him. This boy wanted to kiss him. So I did.”
Dante mouthed “Ah.”
“Yep. Everyone went nuts. Johnny, the other kids, the teachers. And then my mom was called in because my dad was fifty miles away with the school football team at an away game. Boy, she was pissed. So the school thought it would be better if I left for the day so I could be, I don’t know, handled by my parents, I s’pose. My mom was fuming. Spittin’ and cursin’ in the front seat, and half the words I didn’t understand except—”
One. Faggot. He understood that one perfectly.
Dante stared at him, into him. This man likely had had every harsh word and epithet thrown at him. He was smart enough to know what Cade’s mom had said, and even now after twelve years, Cade felt guilty at painting her in this unflattering light. She was a great mom. Cade had simply shocked her that day.
“Then what happened?”
“When we got home, she sent me to my room. Now throughout my childhood she was really sick with a heart condition, which meant she was always tired. On top of this, she suffered from depression and spent a lot of time in her room sleeping. And all I could think was how this would make her worse. My wrongness would make her worse. Later in the afternoon, she came in to see me and told me that she wasn’t going to tell my dad. That was the thing I was worried about the most—and she was clearly worried about it, too. Said he’d be so disappointed if he heard. And then she told me that it was just this phase I was going through.”
He hauled air into his lungs. “That I’d always been too friendly, and one time she lost me in the mall when I was four and she found me an hour later holding another kid’s hand. I’d wanted to play and I just wandered off with this kid I liked the look of. That’s what I’d do. I’d talk to anyone because I loved meeting people. Still do. And I was so trusting. Too trusting.”
Dante was stroking Cade’s cheek now, every pass a balm to his soul. “Nothing wrong with being trusting. Being friendly. I love that about you.”
“Momma didn’t. She said I couldn’t be ‘like that’ at school. I couldn’t walk up to some boy I liked and touch him. Which is generally sound advice, but she said that’s what must have happened. Because I couldn’t possibly like boys, not like that. Boys weren’t supposed to kiss other boys. It was all a mistake, wires crossed in my brain. I felt like I’d let her down, and my dad as well, so I promised I’d be good. I wouldn’t make any trouble and I’d stop being so damn friendly.”
Cade paused, his lungs tightening with each breath he tried to force in and out. In and out. Too much talking. Not enough air.
He shut his eyes, tried to inhale. “A couple of months after this, I came home and found her. At first I thought she was asleep, but she usually got up by five to make dinner and it was five thirty. And she was in there, lying on the bed, peacefully. It killed my dad. I mean, it destroyed him. He loved her so much, and we were so close afterward. Just the two of us against the world, even now. And all I can think of is my mom screaming at me in the car and later telling me how crushed my dad would be. And I don’t want that. I don’t want him to hurt. I can handle this, and keep it in, for him—”
Dante snatched the desperate lie with a kiss. Cade moaned into his mouth, a moan of surprise but also recognition. It had been like this from the beginning. This wasn’t just sex, had never been so for Cade. He was head over skates for this guy.
“I get it, Cade. Really, I do. But don’t you see that your dad only knows this part of you that you’ve decided he should see? Not all of you, the guy you show to me every day?”
Maybe. But Dante knew him. Couldn’t that be enough?
“I don’t care what strangers think of me,” Cade gushed out. “But I do care about putting my dad through any pain. Anything that makes him question how he brought me up, how close we are. This bond we have.”
“You know this for sure? That this is how he’ll react?”
“I know it seems weird, but despite the fact I can’t talk to him about this, we’re like two peas in a pod. It’s the sports connection. I know he’s proud of me. I—I can’t lose that. I think you understand how tough that is.” Dante had come out to the world and was cut off from half his family for his bravery. “Do you think it was worth it? Coming out?”
Dante must have asked himself this over the years, but he still gave it a weighty moment of consideration. “Let me answer that with a story. The one person I was most worried about telling I was gay wasn’t my father, but my nonno. I came out to him when I was sixteen, and he really surprised me. Said he would love me no matter what. Gave me his pocket watch.”
Dante’s expression softened as he recalled this specific memory. “Ten years later, when my grandfather was dying, I went to visit him in hospice. He tapped the watch, knowing it was in my vest pocket. Said it was time and that every second that passed without me telling the world who I was, without taking steps to be truly happy, was a second wasted. We’re given this one life and we have to use it in a way that respects this great gift. Two days after he died, I told my coworkers and never looked back.”
Wow. But then, every coming-out story had a wow factor for someone who couldn’t get to that point. Like Cade.
“Go on. Call me a coward.”
“Nah. You’re doing just fine beating yourself up.” And then Dante smiled, to soften it, perhaps. But that smile . . . it was everything Cade needed right now.
“So.” Dante paused. “When you were a kid, your mom warned you about being too friendly with other kids. That you shouldn’t walk up to another boy and just touch him?”
Cade nodded dumbly.
“You came to that club, Cade, because you wanted to walk up to another boy and touch him. You wanted to talk to me. Tell me your deepest desires. You wanted to be with someone who would understand, who would make you feel good, who would accept you for who you are. When you’re a kid, that’s considered overfriendly, and it gets you into trouble. When you’re a man, a man who’s hiding this hugely important part of himself—a warm, generous, funny man with needs and wants—that’s what’s known as bravery.”
Cade’s heart was ricocheting around his rib cage. He wasn’t brave, nothing of the sort, but with Dante . . . Cade might be brave with him.
“You think that was brave?”
Dante circled his neck with both hands and leaned in, forehead to forehead. Cade loved when he did that. Loved the emotional intimacy of it.
“I do.”
“Thanks for listening.”
“Anytime.”
Even wh
en this was over? Because it had to end, didn’t it? Dante knew what he was about and had clear ideas about what he needed: a scared-of-his-own-shadow fuck buddy would never satisfy him. But today Cade had unburdened himself as much as he was capable, and Dante, this guy who could have anyone, was looking at him like he mattered.
What’s your religion, Burnett?
Dante Moretti, that’s what.
To show his appreciation, Cade kissed him hard, passionately, but soon the kiss slowed to something less urgent. More sensual. And then Cade felt his man’s mouth curve up in a smile against his lips.
He’s happy with me. I make him feel good.
When it was over, hell, when Cade was in the Nursing Home for Aged Hockey Heroes, he would remember this.
Dante drew back, his gaze heavy lidded. “If we keep this up, we’ll never get out the door.”
“Can’t have that.” Cade moved to Dante’s ear and bit his lobe, then soothed the sting with his tongue. He knew his man liked it because Dante shivered and turned his neck to allow better access. Cade took the presented opportunity. Running his lips along Dante’s neck, he moaned at how good it felt to give another person such pleasure.
He curled a finger around the knot in Dante’s towel and pulled, then dropped his own. Dante was the one moaning now as they rubbed against each other, every slide a divine little moment. Chest to chest, hip to hip, cock to cock.
But it wasn’t enough.
“I want more, Dante. All of you, inside me.” He inhaled a breath. “I want it raw.”
Dante froze, drew back, and stared at his man while his dick hardened with each passing second. Jesus. Raw. Did he realize what he was asking?
Of course he did. Cade Burnett had pretty much been in charge all along, and what this guy wanted, he got.
“This usually warrants a more serious conversation.”
“You clean?”
Dante nodded.
“And you’re the only guy I’ve let this close. You need to talk about this anymore?”
“No.”
“Then fuck me properly, borchia.”
Dante shuddered with pleasure at the unvarnished demand and considered their options. Over the sink from behind would be hot—and the mirror would only make it hotter—but Dante really wanted to see everything in Cade’s eyes without any barriers.
“Come on, tesoro.” He led Cade back to the unmade bed. Some of their best moments had happened here—why not continue the streak?
Wordlessly, they spent a few moments lubing up, pausing only for wet kisses and lusty sucks. Dante knelt between Cade’s thighs and took a moment to appreciate the gift he was being given. Not just his body, but everything. From the moment their eyes clashed in that club, Cade had placed so much faith in him.
With slick fingers, he shaped Cade’s length and cupped his balls, finally dipping between his ass cheeks and rubbing at his entrance. He didn’t slip inside yet, just applied a little pressure that he knew would feel so good and tingly. Cade rolled his hips, needing more, begging for it.
And Dante obliged. One finger in, then two, so slippery, a beautiful stretch. And while watching his fingers vanish inside Cade was hot, it couldn’t beat watching the man’s eyes as they changed color from bright hazel to burnished whiskey to the darkest bourbon.
The anticipation was near killing Dante, his cock a steel rod dying to get good and snug, but he stayed with the fingers. He needed Cade to be on the precipice of pleasure before he entered him properly.
“If you keep that up,” Cade panted, “I’m not going to last.”
But Dante knew his man’s body now, just how close to the edge he could push without hurling him over. A few more minutes, and Cade was ready. Dante’s mouth watered as he knelt closer and gripped Cade’s hips.
The first touch of Dante’s cock to Cade’s body had them both groaning. Cade leaned up on his elbows. “Need to see.”
Both of them watched as the broad head of Dante’s naked cock notched and nudged in, seeking access beyond that resistant ring of muscle. So tight. So perfect. With one hand he grasped Cade’s and laced their fingers together as he pushed in all the way.
Skin on skin. Completely connected. At every single point.
He leaned in and kissed his man. “I’ve got you, Cade.”
He could have been talking about much more than all these “firsts” Cade was experiencing with Dante. Dante knew pain, the love of his family fragmented and lost to him. But he’d learned to live with it because a life of honesty made that initial pain bearable. Cade would get there, too.
“Stroke it out, baby.”
Cade pumped along his length, which only made Dante harder, filling Cade up further. Promise bloomed into pleasure. Another slide, deeper this time, and Cade’s eyes glazed over.
That perfect moment.
“You feel me?”
Cade tried to speak but nothing came out, just a smile, and Dante could only lean in and taste that smile. He kept up that slow glide in and out, his eyes never leaving the face of this man he’d come to care for. Deeply.
Rather than think too hard about that, Dante lost himself to the sensations: Cade’s sinful mouth, his cock-hugging body, their interlocked fingers. And those eyes—trusting Dante to guide him deep to the ultimate destination.
Going harder and faster would have gotten them both off sooner. They were already late for work, but Dante was in no hurry for this to end. That would come eventually. But not today.
For now, Dante gave himself over to slow, sinful pleasure and holding on to this connection for as long as he could.
FOURTEEN
Dante leaned against the bar in the ballroom of the Drake, one eye on the well-heeled crowd, the other on the main entrance through which he expected Cade any minute. Not every player had been volunteered for the Hockey for Everyone fund-raiser, but Rebels’ PR had been extra solicitous of the officially unattached players. If Dante had known there’d be a bachelor auction later, he probably wouldn’t have nominated single man-about-town Cade Burnett to attend.
We do what we must for the children.
“The bartender’s hot,” Harper said, nudging him to look at the broad-shouldered specimen behind the bar, who was yes, objectively hot. “Maybe the rough trade is more your speed.”
Dante gave her the side-eye. “I’m sorry I haven’t jumped the bones of anyone you’ve thrown in my path, Harper. I know how disappointing that must be for you.”
She raised an eyebrow, not buying his contrition. “I had high hopes for you and this chef they did a profile of in last month’s Chicago magazine. Even called him up, but he’s playing house with some hottie firefighter.”
“Never would have worked. I can’t stand anyone else in my kitchen.” Except Cade. Cade with his black and green olives and fifty other toppings. Cade and his mission to find the best wine with the ugliest labels.
Just. Cade.
He cleared his throat. “This past month has been crazy busy anyway.”
“But crazy productive.”
True. They were six games out with a real shot at getting to the play-offs. Petrov was playing well; DuPre, Callaghan, and St. James were in top form; and their defense led by one hot property named Cade Burnett was rock solid. Looked like Dante might be keeping his job after all.
As if he’d conjured him from thin air, here came the man himself with Isobel on one arm and Violet on the other. Game-day suit with tie, broad shoulders filling it out to perfection. Isobel peeled off from them, leaving Cade and Violet, who incidentally looked really cute together, to walk to the bar.
“Dante!” Violet hugged him, a surprise because this was not part of their social contract. “Dios, you look hot. No one fills out a suit like you do.”
He laughed, because that’s exactly what he’d been thinking about Cade. His eyes found his guy’s, and they exchanged a scorching look before Cade tore his gaze away with, “Excuse me, gotta use the little boys’ room.”
Violet calle
d out after him, “Need company? I’ve got my camera!”
He waved her off without turning.
“Do I want to know what that’s about?” Dante asked.
“No,” Harper said with a sharp look at Violet, who just gave an impish smile. She pulled down her red dress, though it was so short it had no chance of meeting up with her thigh-high boots. Tattooed roses and elaborate symbols on her thighs and upper arms made her skin gleam vibrantly. “Okay, I need to talk to whoever’s running this auction to make sure we’re on the same page. Meaning, which bribes will work. Highlander, I’m comin’ for ya.” Violet charged off.
Before Dante could comment, Harper turned to him, her tongue rolling in her cheek.
“What?” asked Dante.
“If I’d known you were otherwise occupied, I wouldn’t have wasted my resources.”
“Excuse me?”
“You and—” She leaned in and whispered, “My favorite D-man. I can’t believe I didn’t see it before now.”
She knows nothing. “Whatever are you yammering on about, Harper?”
She waved in the direction of the restrooms. “I saw how you guys checked each other out.”
“I’m gay. Sometimes I can’t help but appreciate a good-looking guy in a suit.”
“Oh, and he was appreciating you right back.” She shook her head in wonder. “Makes sense, really. I wasn’t buying that Violet business for a second. So, are you going to stick with longing glances or wait until after the play-offs to make a move?”
He opened his mouth, but apparently something Harper saw on his face gave him away.
“Wow, I am totally late to this party.”
“There’s no party, Harper. You can get that matchmaker glint out of your eye right now.” Confirming her suspicion would only out a man who wasn’t ready, and while he had no doubt Harper would be empathetic, this was not Dante’s place. Cade would take that step whenever he was ready.
If he was ever ready.
Harper frowned, evidently not buying his denial. “Dante, if you need to—” But whatever she intended to say was cut off by the arrival of Remy, who wrapped himself around her. She shot Dante a look that said later, and he made a quick escape.
