by Anna Martin
He left the Caddy parked haphazardly in front of the stone steps that led up to the house, forcing other guests to walk around it.
This party was different from the others, and Jared, at first, couldn’t put his finger on why. He did the same as always, exploring on his own until he found the kitchen, then fixed a drink and wandered some more. The house was almost clinically white, and smelled of beeswax and something expensive. The carpets were thick and luxurious under his feet, and he winced as freshmen in inadvisable shoes ground their icepick heels into the plush.
The difference between the two parties dawned on him as he found a parlor room where the DJ was set up; there were far fewer people here than usual. The lack of partiers wasn’t likely to be due to Clare’s lack of popularity, more like her attempt at exclusivity. Clare wasn’t going to let the hoi polloi into her expensive Georgian-style home. Only the very best got a pass.
For that reason alone, Jared wondered why he was here.
After a nod at Chris, and raising his glass to Clare, who was dressed in a blood-red gown that made her skin look paler, her hair darker, Jared continued to wander. He wasn’t in the mood for them tonight, the king and queen of Harbor Academy with their sense of entitlement.
In the basement, Jared found the real party.
It had been converted into the game room of many a teenage boy’s wet dream. Two pool tables competed for space at the end of the room, then game stations lined the walls, each with a sixty-five-inch TV and proper gamer’s chairs.
Boys he recognized from around school were either absorbed in Mortal Combat or Grand Theft Auto while others cheered them on in little clusters. There was a small bar tucked away in one corner; Jared guessed more than bottles of Bud were crammed into the small fridge space.
A group of people were congregated on sofas and beanbags in the center of the room, half watching the revolving games of pool, some with an eye on the video games. Most of them, around thirty or so, were just chatting.
Jared let his shoulders sag in relief. This, he could cope with.
“Jared!” someone called, and he met Mia’s smile with a genuine one of his own.
“Hey,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss her cheek. “You look great.”
It was a standard greeting now. All the girls liked to be told how good they looked, and Jared was happy to oblige.
“You know most people,” Mia said to him rather than the group at large. “That’s my cousin, Ben, and my other cousins, Emma and Piper.”
Jared nodded a greeting and raised his glass to the now infamous Ben “Macklemore” Haggerty. “Nice to meet you,” he said, wondering why on earth the guy was at a high school New Year’s Eve party. Whatever.
He couldn’t see Adam anywhere, and that was good, for now. Settling on the arm of one of the leather couches, he watched and listened for a while, occasionally adding to the conversation when he had something worth saying.
It would probably always be like this for him—included, but on the outskirts of the Harbor Academy social group. Even if he could go back in time and enroll at the tender age of thirteen with the rest of the kids, he wouldn’t have done it. The outsider’s perspective had made him appreciate things in a different way. He looked down on snobbishness and entitlement, and worked hard to eradicate it from himself.
The pink Cadillac was an exception.
After a little while, Ben stood and excused himself. There was somewhere else for him to be, and Mia escorted him out of the house while two of her girlfriends descended into giggles and whispers behind their hands. Jared sighed to himself and slid into the vacated seat.
“See,” Mia said triumphantly when she returned. “I told you he’d come if I asked him.”
Jared suppressed a smile and fetched himself a beer from the fridge. He couldn’t be bothered to go all the way upstairs for another whiskey. There wasn’t any danger of him throwing a big New Harbor party before they graduated, but if he did, it would be like this. Not upstairs, with Queen Clare presiding over the peasants, but like this easy atmosphere in her basement with people he thought might be his friends after all.
After Jared’s third beer, he was starting to get a little fuzzy, enough to relax into the corner of the couch with his arm around Ryder, hugging her close. She still wasn’t drinking after her overdose and seemed as tired and weary as he was. It was nice, having her small, warm body pressed into his side, even if her fake boobs were uncomfortably hard. Her hair smelled nice, and Jared wondered if he could ever go straight for a girl. Probably not. But it was interesting to think about.
When a strong, warm hand landed on his shoulder, Jared knew who it was without turning. Not Chris or the surprising return of Macklemore, but the one person he’d been avoiding for months.
Conversation in the small group silenced immediately as thirty pairs of eyes swiveled in Adam’s direction.
“Can I talk to you?” Adam said in a low voice.
Jared paused for a moment, during which those thirty pairs of eyes moved to look at him. If he said yes, they’d gossip as soon as he left. If he said no, he’d look like a dick.
They were going to talk anyway.
He got up.
Without saying anything else, Adam walked out of the room, not waiting for Jared to follow. It was a habit that had made Jared crazy before, and not much had changed. He didn’t look back as he used his long legs to catch Adam up and followed him wordlessly through the Metagos’ house.
Outside it was freezing. A bitterly cold wind whipped at the corners of the house and stung Jared’s exposed hands and face for the few moments they were outside. Adam immediately ducked into a doorway Jared hadn’t noticed before.
“Jeez,” Jared muttered, rubbing his hands together for warmth.
“Sorry,” Adam said to Jared’s great surprise and flicked on both lights and heaters.
It was a huge, luxuriously appointed pool house with a deep, half-Olympic pool and a Jacuzzi at the far end. He guessed the wood-clad room next to the Jacuzzi was a steam room.
Under the surface of the water, more lights glowed, casting flickering shadows on the low ceiling. It was a beautiful space, but Jared didn’t know why he was here.
For a moment he looked at Adam.
Still slim, still perfect, still needing a haircut where the soft brown waves fell into his eyes. Jared itched to reach over and push them back from Adam’s face. He reined in his impulses and bit down on his self-control, willing it to stay strong.
Adam was wearing a shirt and jeans, like most of the guys at the party, although his looked far more expensive. He was playing with the cuff of his shirt, not looking up, not making any move to tell Jared what the hell he’d dragged him out here for.
Making a snap decision, Jared turned to leave.
“Don’t go,” Adam said immediately.
Jared sighed. “Okay. What do you want?”
Adam’s nostrils flared, like he was supremely uncomfortable. He probably was. Jared noticed everything at once—the twitching fingertips, the one knee bouncing in place like it did when Adam was upset or annoyed or bored. The eyes that still wouldn’t fucking meet his.
“I want to go back,” Adam said, so quietly Jared had to strain to hear him over the sound of gently lapping water.
“Go back to what?”
“Being able to sleep. To the day before Chris’s party and tell Clare to fuck off. To the moment before you left after… after… and tell you what I was going to say.”
“What were you going to say?” Jared asked. His stomach knotted tightly and his fingertips were cold again.
Adam looked up, eyes pleading, as if begging for Jared to not make him say it. They were long past Jared doing anything to make Adam feel better, though, and he waited patiently for the next words to fall from Adam’s lips.
“I was going to say… to tell you… I was in love with you. Am,” he corrected, looking down at his shoes. “I am in love with you.”
“No you’re n
ot,” Jared said sharply.
“It would be a lot easier if I wasn’t, believe me,” Adam said with a harsh, humorless laugh.
Jared waited for a few moments while the silence hung thickly between them. “So, what now?”
“I think,” Adam said slowly, “That I’d like you to let me. Love you, I mean.”
A piece of Jared’s carefully constructed armor cracked, with a tiny fissure that spread and grew until it was all threatening to come down around him.
“I don’t know if I can do that,” Jared admitted. His voice didn’t sound like he remembered it. There was a new roughness that probably had something to do with the hard lump lodged in his throat.
“Okay,” Adam said. “I suppose I deserve that. I just had to know….”
“I don’t want to go back,” Jared said. “I don’t want to hide in your room from the rest of the world. I don’t want there to be something no one else is allowed to see in case they get the wrong impression. If there’s something there, I want everyone to know about it. I want it to be out there for judgment and criticism and comment, and I want you to own it. Own it, Adam, not hide from it.”
“I can do that,” Adam said stubbornly.
“Can you?”
“I can try. If you’ll let me.”
“What if it all goes wrong? What then?”
“Then… I can go on knowing I took a chance on the one thing that has actually meant shit to me in my whole life so far.”
That defiant jut to his chin had been Jared’s kryptonite since the first time he walked into New Harbor Academy and saw the young man with the world on his shoulders, who visibly didn’t give a fuck. The rest of his armor melted away, forgotten as he crossed the few paces between them and caught Adam’s face in his hands.
Their lips knew this dance, knew the familiarity of each other, and the warmth and the strength and the love. Adam choked on a sob as he grabbed hold of Jared’s waist so hard it hurt and kissed back desperately, as if trying to show Jared everything at once, everything he had.
For all the passion in that one kiss, it didn’t last too long. Jared folded his arms around Adam’s slim frame, holding him close, resting his cheek on Adam’s soft, silky hair. Adam seemed taken aback, then he hesitantly wrapped his arms around Jared’s waist, turned his head and sighed, pressing his cheek to Jared’s shoulder.
“I’m so sorry,” Adam mumbled.
Jared didn’t ask “what for?” even though he was tempted. In a way it didn’t matter what for. What mattered was Adam letting his guard down enough to apologize in the first place. He ran his fingers through Adam’s hair, gently untangling the strands and smoothing the back of his neck.
“That night,” Adam said, not looking up from his spot on Jared’s shoulder, “I was going to come back to bed and ask you to be my first. I wanted you to show me making love, you know, like what I’d just done with you. I was washing my face in the bathroom and I thought there might be someone else, years from now, who might be the right person to be my first, but I have you now.”
“You wanted me to fuck you? That night?”
“Yeah,” Adam whispered. “I wanted you to love me back.”
Something clenched uncomfortably in Jared’s chest, and he held Adam a little tighter. This wasn’t the time or the place for him to say it back, but it was right there. Clogging his arteries, filling his chest and lungs, making his head hurt.
“Do you want to get out of here?” Adam said, pulling back a little.
That was hell of a question. Did he?
“Yeah,” Jared said with a laugh.
“Okay. I’ll call a car.”
“I drove,” Jared said quickly.
“The Cadillac? Will you ever tell me about that?”
“Maybe,” Jared said. Adam was persuasive at the best of times, and Jared had almost no willpower when he was naked and entranced. Except for that one time. He wasn’t going to think about that now, though.
Adam grinned and reached for Jared’s hand, quietly tangling their fingers together. It was reassurance, maybe, and a little hope.
Chapter 17
Instead of going back through the house where they’d surely be stopped by someone, Adam led them around the side, through a rose garden that was sticks and thorns this time of year.
“Shh,” Jared whispered with a grin as he slid into the Caddy and turned the engine over. It roared to life, ever conspicuous, and he quickly pulled out onto the main road.
“Should you be driving?” Adam asked.
“Probably not.”
Adam nodded once and told him not to wrap the car around some tree on the way home. Jared didn’t say anything and paid closer attention to the road than he ever did sober, hardly looking over to where Adam was staring dreamily out the window.
“You can’t play Big Poppa’s music in this car,” Adam grouched as the CD player turned over to “Ready To Die.”
He fiddled with the radio instead of swapping the album for another, and Jared signaled, then turned into the narrow opening in the bushes that led to Adam’s place. He’d come here on autopilot rather than going back to his house. This, somehow, felt more appropriate. Returning to the scene of the crime.
As he slowed and put the car in park, the radio station hissed and started to play an oddly familiar tune. Jared looked at Adam with a questioning expression. For a moment, they both listened, then Adam cracked first. Jared started laughing a moment later.
“Fucking Whitney Houston,” he said, killing the engine and the music at the same time.
Adam snorted, then giggled again.
On the front steps, Adam stopped Jared with a hand on his wrist.
“It’s nearly midnight,” he said.
“Um, okay.”
“Stay here? Trust me, please.”
Jared nodded and wrapped his arms around himself to keep out the chill. There would be frost tonight, he was sure of that much.
It didn’t take long for Adam to come back, thundering down the stairs, then kicking the front door open. In his arms was a thick, bundled comforter, not the one from his room, probably one of the guest beds.
“I wanna watch the fireworks,” he said by way of explanation.
Jared grinned.
They managed to work it so they sat, backs against the door, feet stretched out in front of them with the huge, king-sized comforter wrapped around and underneath them. A few minutes later, the fireworks started, off in the distance first, over Seattle, then a few closer to home.
“It’s so dark out here,” Jared murmured. “You can see it really clearly.”
Adam dropped his head to Jared’s shoulder and hummed softly. “No light pollution. Not here, anyway.”
“Yeah.”
When they kissed it was soft, quiet, only the tiniest flicker of tongue, and Jared wondered if they’d forget the idea of having sex tonight altogether. If he was honest with himself, he was still a little wary that this could be another trap, another trick or layer to the bet.
“If I asked,” Jared said softly, his words framed by the banging and fizzing of fireworks, “would you tell me everything?”
“What, about…?”
“The bet.”
“Oh. Yeah. What do you want to know?”
“No.”
“No?”
“I was just wondering if you’d tell me. If I asked.”
Jared brushed his cold nose against Adam’s, then took his hand to haul them both to their feet. He grabbed the comforter when it seemed Adam was going to leave it outside and tossed it on the floor just inside the door.
“I’m confused,” Adam grumbled as they walked up the stairs, heading to Adam’s room without discussion.
Inside the darkened bedroom, Jared backed Adam up against the door and once again wrapped his cold palms around Adam’s strong jaw. When Adam made no protest, he licked deep into his mouth, taking hard and quick with a kiss that was designed to weaken knees.
Adam leaned up on his
toes, closing the height difference between them, and bit Jared’s earlobe.
“I want you inside me,” he murmured. “I want you, any way I can get you.”
“Are you sure? This is….” Jared stepped back, bracing his arms either side of Adam’s shoulders on the door. He shook his head. “So fucking new, you know?”
“Don’t get cold feet on me now.” He smiled, reaching up to pull Jared close. “I’ve waited for this for a long time. I want you, Jared.”
“Okay.”
They fell onto the bed in a tangle of limbs, kicking clothes off, then snuggling under the heavy comforter where it was warm. This place was familiar, a sweet cocoon where they knew each other. Jared could shut down, stop thinking, and just touch, just feel, just be with the person who was driving him crazy.
Making out under the covers was good for a few minutes, then the lack of oxygen made them both lightheaded and Adam threw back the comforter with a laugh. Jared could see him now, see him better, anyway, and was struck once again by how truly, incredibly beautiful he was.
Adam still balanced on the cusp of manhood. There wasn’t any hair on his chest yet, and he didn’t get much stubble on his cheeks. His shoulders were broad, though, and his dick was definitely fully mature. The strong jaw and defined cheekbones made him look elegant, and soft eyelashes and silky hair gave him an edge of femininity he carried with no shame.
Jared brushed the back of his hand over Adam’s cheek, allowing himself to want and touch and take. With a knowing grin, Adam caught hold of Jared’s hand and kissed it, then sucked two fingers into his mouth. He kept his eyes firmly fixed on Jared as he swirled his tongue around the fingertips.
Biting his lip Jared tried hard not to make a sound, not to break this magic and connection they had together. Adam was imitating the best blowjob Jared had ever received, and it was insane, too good to be real.
They rolled until Adam was on his back, then he finally let go of Jared’s wrist and directed the hand down between his spread thighs.
