by Dev Bentham
Tia Bel looked up at me, her eyebrows raised. “This is real?”
I nodded.
She set the papers down on the desk and folded her hands on top. “And you’re leaving.”
“It’s for the best.”
Her shoulders slumped. “I can’t decide if you’re a bad man or just stupid.”
“Probably a little of both.” I held out my hand. “Take care of yourself. And don’t let Martim take on too much. The stress can’t be good for him.”
She ignored my hand, stood, and walked around the desk. She planted herself in front of me and looked up. “I will tell him.” The scent of lavender swirled around me as she pulled me down and brushed kisses on both my cheeks. “Idiota.”
I turned and strode out the door before either of us could say anything else. Better to end on a good note.
Outside, the doorman waved down a taxi. I tipped lavishly, the last of the big-time spenders, then climbed into the cab and headed toward the airport and a long day of travel.
The cab driver was a large older man with a salt-and-pepper beard. He wove in and out of traffic, driving like the car was an extension of his body. By this point in his career, it probably was. He glanced in the mirror. “Did you have a nice visit in Lisbon?”
I leaned back in the seat. That was a so much more complicated question than he could possibly imagine. A brightly colored wooden rooster with LISBON painted on the side bounced from a beaded string around his rearview mirror, a tacky looking thing, maybe a gift from a child or left behind by some tourist.
I gestured to it. “What’s the story with the roosters? They’re everywhere.”
“It’s an old legend. A rich man accused his dinner guest of stealing his silver. The guest said, ‘No, no, I am innocent.’ The rich man didn’t believe him, so the guest pointed to a dead bird on the table and said, ‘If I am innocent, let this cock crow.’” The cab driver caught my eye in the mirror. “And you know what happened? It sat up on its plate and crowed.”
“What about the silver?”
He shrugged.
Right. Who cared about silver when birds could rise from the dead? I looked out at the city, a modern metropolis evidently steeped in ancient superstitions. “What is it supposed to mean?”
He stroked the rooster. “That’s simple. Honor and trust.”
I watched the red-and-black wooden bird swing as we changed lanes.
What the fuck am I doing?
I leaned forward. “Drop me off here.”
He looked at me in surprise. “You are still a long way from the airport, Senhor.”
“It’s fine. Just let me off. I need to think.”
“If you say so.” He zigged into the right lane and pulled to a stop. Horns honked behind us.
I handed him a bill. “Keep the change.”
His eyes went wide. “Thank you.”
After he drove off, I stood on the sidewalk beside my roller bag. I had no idea what I was doing. But I couldn’t leave Lisbon. Not yet. I turned and started walking back the way we had just come.
BY THE time I got back to the hotel, my feet hurt like hell and I’d sweated through my shirt. Tia Bel was at the counter talking with the clerk. Her mouth dropped open when she saw me, but a moment later she’d engulfed me in lavender again. As we exchanged cheek kisses, she whispered, “He’s in the office. Go now.”
I pulled away and gestured to my wrinkled clothes. “I should shower and change.”
“No. Go in now. I will take care of your things.” She grabbed the handle of my suitcase and shooed me toward the office.
I straightened my collar and pulled down the sleeves of my suit. The five steps to the office door felt longer than the three hours I’d just spent walking around Lisbon. I ran a hand through my hair, took a deep breath, and knocked.
“Entrar.” Martim’s rich baritone sent a shiver of nervousness through me.
I opened the door.
Martim looked up. He blinked. “She said you’d gone.”
“I came back.” I crossed to the desk and stood looking down at him. “There were things I didn’t say.”
“You made the payment. Both for this year and last.” He sat back in his chair and looked up at me wide-eyed. “Thank you. I will pay you back as quickly as I can. But why did you do that?”
“Because you deserve a second chance.” I put my hands on the desk and leaned forward, wanting him to understand. “So what if Tia Bel messed up? She did what she did because she loves you. And you’ve come a long way—you’re clean, you’re running every day, you’re dealing with your health. Taking away the hotel now would be—” I paused, searching for the right word. “It would be wrong.”
“I keep telling you, you don’t need to feel guilty.” He shook his head. “And I wouldn’t use over losing the hotel.”
I threw up my hands. “But I am guilty. I’ve spent the last ten years preying on other people’s mistakes.”
He raised his eyebrows. “And you paid my bills to atone? I am very grateful. But won’t your boss be angry?”
“I sent in my resignation letter last night. Effective immediately. I can’t do it anymore. It’s immoral.” I didn’t tell him that Rex had responded by firing me, effective twenty minutes before I resigned. Not that it mattered. Either way I was out of a job.
“Oh, querido.” Martim stood up and came around the desk. “You were always so hard on yourself.”
“Maybe that used to be true, but lately I’m not tough enough. I haven’t been paying attention, and what I just realized is what a waste I’ve made of my life. Maybe because there wasn’t anyone around to challenge me.”
His lip twitched into a half smile. “You hated it when I questioned your motives.”
“Well, I was wrong.” We stood only a few feet apart. I reached for his hand. “Look, I know I messed up yesterday. I reacted from my own phobias, and I hurt you.”
Martim shook his head. His fingers intertwined with mine. “I was the one who reacted badly. I came over this morning to apologize, but you were gone. It was unfair of me to expect you to immediately be okay with something I’ve been dealing with for months.”
I squeezed his hand. “Do you think we could try again?”
He cocked his head to one side. “Things have not changed since last night. I still have the disease.”
I shrugged. “I’ve been trusting my life to condoms ever since you left. At least this time I know what it is I’m risking.”
He smiled. “If you are propositioning me, querido, then I am saying yes.”
“Yes, we can try having sex again? Or yes we can do that right now?”
He leaned forward and whispered, “Yes.”
The warmth of his breath against my lips sent a shiver through me. I pulled him to me and kissed him, trying to pour all the longing and imagining and dreaming I’d been doing into it, as if one kiss could convince him, seduce him, and mend everything that was broken between us.
When we broke, we were both gasping.
“I don’t think I can walk through the hotel like this.” He gave me that quirky smile. “It’s a good thing that housekeeping hasn’t cleaned your room yet.”
“I didn’t leave any condoms there.” I caressed his cheek. Now that I was touching him, I didn’t want to stop. “Give me a minute, and I’ll go out to the farmácia.”
“Don’t worry.” He reached across the desk and opened the top drawer. He pulled out a small metal box. “As soon as I saw you that first day, I stocked up.”
WE DIDN’T encounter anyone as we climbed the back stairs. The room was just as I’d left it, empty except for the unmade bed. Martim hung out the Do Not Disturb sign and closed the door behind him. The metal box clattered as he tossed it onto the bed. We were alone in a bedroom again for the second time in twenty-four hours.
I dropped my jacket on the bedside chair and held Martim’s gaze as I loosened my tie and unbuttoned the top few buttons of my shirt. “I should take a shower. It wa
s a long walk back.”
“My tia says sweaty men are sexy.” Martim kicked off his shoes and pushed me back onto the bed. He followed, his body a warm, delicious weight on mine.
I ran my hands along his back, feeling the muscles beneath his shirt. “That doesn’t mean it’s true.”
“I don’t want to stop.” He propped himself on his elbows and looked down at me. “This is nice right now. We can shower after.”
I opened my legs, and Martim dropped a thigh between mine. I gasped as he rocked forward and caressed the base of my cock with his hip. I grabbed his ass, my hands slipping on the fabric.
I yanked at the back of his shirt, pulling it out of his pants. “Too many clothes.”
“I’ll race you.” He rolled off me and started quickly unbuttoning his shirt.
“What do I get if I win?” I sat up and tugged my shirt over my head.
“The same thing you get if you lose.” He arched his back as he pushed down his pants. I stopped what I was doing to watch.
“You’re gorgeous. You’ve really grown into your body.”
He paused, his lean body half-in, half-out of his clothes. “I’m glad you didn’t see me a year ago. I wasn’t very beautiful then. And what are you doing sitting and staring? Take off your clothes.”
“Still the romantic.” But I did what I was told.
We lay on the rumpled sheets facing each other. He smelled of coffee and the same aftershave he’d used when we were younger.
Martim touched my cheek. “We can go slowly. Do other things.”
I cupped his hand to my face and kissed his palm. “We’ll do it all.”
He slid his hand behind my neck. His mouth on mine was fierce, possessive. It had always been like that between us. One minute playful and the next breathless. In the first millisecond that his tongue entered my mouth, my stupid brain tossed me the vision of viruses coursing through his blood. Then I let myself imagine the strength of his skin, holding him together, keeping me safe. His brave, amazing skin that had taken him through so much and brought him to the other side, strong, gorgeous, and, at least in that moment, all mine.
He tasted delicious, like himself. I dropped his hand and fumbled behind me until I found his metal box. I didn’t want to let go of the sweet sensation of his mouth on mine. I’d been without this for way too long. Without breaking the kiss, I fiddled with the box until it opened, then found a condom by touch.
Martim rolled me onto my back. His lips slid off mine, across my cheek, and down to the crook of my neck, the spot no one else had ever managed to hit just right. I shivered. If he kept that up, I wasn’t going to last very long. Behind his back, I tore open the condom wrapper.
At the sound, he pulled back. “Are you sure? You don’t have to prove anything to me.”
“I wish you’d stop asking me that and just fuck me.” I smiled up at him. “Yes, lover, I’m sure.”
“Maybe you want to prove something to yourself. Okay. I’m here with whatever you want.” He held himself up on one arm while I rolled the condom onto his dick, which felt like hot, pulsing steel under my fingers. When I had it secure, he pulled a tube of lube out of the box. I bent my leg so he could get at my asshole. He touched me and I stopped breathing. For years I’d been dreaming about his fingers gently opening me up. Now it was finally happening. He’d been my first. But not my only. He could be my last.
I exhaled. “I’m not fragile anymore. You can go faster.”
“So you’ve been with other men?” He shoved two fingers into me, up to the hilt. I gasped. More, I wanted more. I wanted him to climb inside me and stay.
“You weren’t there.” I squirted lube onto my palm and greased his cock. I held his gaze. “But sometimes I pretended you were.”
He groaned. “Querido.”
And then he was holding himself up on straight arms and pushing into me. I stuffed a pillow under my ass and hooked my ankles over his shoulders, wanting him deep and fast. A horn honked outside the window, and then a tram bell rang. Martim’s body was a beautiful sculpture, glistening with sweat. His eyes darkened, and his lips opened. He shifted his hips, and oh my God, there it was. I arched on the bed, pressing myself into him as he pounded the spot again and again. I held on to the bedclothes, afraid that if I touched myself I’d shoot. We were both panting. I’d never wanted anything more than I wanted him. I’d always wanted him.
Martim whispered, “I love you.”
Balancing on one arm, he grasped my cock with the other hand. Two brisk strokes and I was coming hard, shooting onto his hand and my chest and grinding my ass against his cock as if I could weld us together. Martim cried out and followed, emptying himself into me. Even through the condom I could feel his cock pulsing as he came.
In the old days, he would have collapsed onto me, and we might have lain like that until his cock softened and fell out of my ass. This time he stayed upright. My heart melted as I watched how carefully he gripped the base of the condom. Still, I winced as he pulled out of me.
He rolled out of bed and walked to the bathroom. I grabbed a tissue and wiped my chest. Running water drowned out the sound of traffic on the street below. When he returned, I pulled him back onto the bed and into my arms. He nestled his face against my neck and almost instantly fell asleep.
“I love you too.” I brushed a curl of hair from his forehead. “I always have.”
Martim. In the flesh. Entirely himself. I listened to him breathe until I drifted off to sleep. Content for the first time in years.
Epilogue
TIA BEL baked a cake. I wore my best suit, and Martim looked splendid in black pants and a button-down shirt. It was just the three of us and the hotel’s lawyer on a quiet February afternoon. Tia was getting ready to go on vacation. Martim had just celebrated two years clean, and I was signing on as a full partner in the Sabido hotel. Once we had all the paperwork signed, our first order of business would be to write Rex Davis a check for the full amount of the loan.
By the time I’d gotten back to Chicago, Rex had had security toss the personal stuff from my office, such as it was, into the dumpster. Which had been fine with me. It made packing that much easier. Aiden had been more gracious than I’d expected, and it had taken less than a week for me to clear out of the condo. I’d arrived back in Lisbon with a small mound of suitcases filled with clothes, papers, and knickknacks. I didn’t have a job, but I still had money from the condo sale. It had taken time, but with my good credit and our combined business sense we’d managed to procure a legitimate bank loan with a reasonable payment schedule. Now we might not be debt free, but we were much closer than the year before.
Sunshine streamed in through the window, coloring everything gold. The lawyer was a dour man who had worked for the hotel since Martim’s father’s days. He stood over me while I signed, like he was watching an execution. Clearly he didn’t approve of an American taking over a third of an old Portuguese family business, or maybe it was the way I’d entered the family that sparked his disapproval. Either way, I was just as glad that he’d declined any refreshment and got right to work. Even without coffee and cake, getting through the legalities took a full hour.
Finally Martim walked the lawyer to the door while I stared at the pile of papers tying me to Lisbon and the Sabido family.
“It’s a happy day.” Tia Bel engulfed me in the scent of lavender and kissed my cheek.
“Obrigado.” I kissed her back.
She laughed and gave my shoulders more fluttery pats. It was her standard response any time I tried to communicate in Portuguese, even something as simple as thank you. Martim said my accent was improving. Tia Bel’s amusement made me think he wasn’t exactly telling the truth.
She gave me one more pat and scooped up the uncut cake. “We will celebrate tonight. I will make a feast.”
With that, she swept out of the hotel dining room. I watched her go, thinking that she really was a wonderful woman and a loving aunt. As long as I loved Martim, she
loved me. I had no doubt that if I ever messed up with him again, she’d have my balls. Martim had been right. Her heart was in the right place.
“Olà, partner.” Martim leaned against the doorway. My heart took a couple of extra beats. He looked long, lean, and healthy, a suave European man dressed in black slacks and a white shirt open at the collar. And according to his last test, virus free.
I glanced out the window. The streets were still damp from the morning rain, but the clouds had drifted away. I crossed the room to Martim and took his hand. “It’s beautiful out. Tia Bel can take care of the hotel for a few hours. Let’s go for a walk.”
“I’d like that.” God, I loved his smile. It lit up his whole face. “It isn’t supposed to rain again until tonight.”
“We’ll be back by then. Happily tucked up in bed.” I pulled him out onto the street where there was a rain-washed scent underneath the smell of car fumes and ancient garbage.
He squeezed my hand. “That would be a good idea too.”
I laughed. “Come on. Let’s go down to the Praça do Comércio and watch the tourists.”
“It’s the American in you, isn’t it? You like the wide-open spaces.” He dropped my hand and kept pace with me as we walked along the sidewalk. “Do you miss it?”
“Chicago? Hell no.” I thought of my gray, empty life there. “What’s to miss? It’s minus ten degrees there now.”
Cars splashed through puddles in the street. Umbrella salesmen stood on corners waiting for the rain to start again.
We turned down one street and then another, and there was the giant square surrounded by eighteenth-century government buildings with cheerful yellow facings. In the center sat a bronze statue of King José I looking triumphantly out toward the river while his horse pranced on snakes.
