by Joey W. Hill
“Easy pet. Slow it down.” Marcus tugged his hair, curling his fingers deep into Thomas’s scalp. “There we go. Manage the lust, pleasure your Master.”
It was his pleasure to obey such a directive. Focusing, he sucked on the ridge of the head, worked his way up and down the shaft with a careful pace but fierce purpose, lashing every erogenous point and savoring the way it felt to hold Marcus’s cock in his mouth. The one and only person allowed to do it now. Marcus’s fingers flexed on him.
“My sweet pet. That fucking gorgeous mouth. All I could think about on the plane was having you on your knees like this. I’d have had you do it in front of every man there and let them wish it was them. You’re the only Christmas gift I want. Now or forever.”
Thomas swallowed, his focus shifting at the vehemence in Marcus’s voice. He changed his strategy, sliding slowly all the way up Marcus’s shaft only to lay kisses all the way back down, nuzzle it with his cheek, nip at his thighs, his balls, sucking one in his mouth.
“Jesus.” Marcus’s fingers constricted in his hair. Yeah, his Master loved having his balls sucked like that. He’d also learned Marcus loved to have his rim tongued, but Thomas wasn’t allowed to do that too often. Most mornings, Thomas woke to find Marcus curled up behind him, a strong arm over his hip, chest or waist. His Master held on tight to what was his when he slept. Though on rare occasions, Thomas, the early riser of the two of them, would wake and find Marcus had turned to his other side in his sleep, presenting Thomas an irresistible opportunity. Thomas could work his way down the line of his spine with his mouth, winding his arms around Marcus to grip his turgid morning erection. When he reached his buttocks, he’d snake a tongue between to play. The first time he’d done it, Marcus’s grip on the railings of the head board had almost broken them, so violent was his reaction to the pleasuring.
“Same goes, Master,” Thomas said. “You’re the Christmas gift I always wanted.”
“Come here.” Marcus pulled him to his feet. “Get rid of the jeans and shoes. I want you in the bed.”
Thomas kicked all of it free, and Marcus propelled him to their bedroom. He didn’t wait, pushing Thomas onto the bed, on his back, making it clear how he wanted him. Thomas slid over, making room as Marcus finished undressing. Thomas’s gaze slid over his husband’s body as Marcus shrugged out of the tailored shirt and slacks, the snug dark shorts beneath. The man was a god in every way, not an inch of marble flesh flawed. It never failed to make Thomas insane with lust and overwhelmed with emotion to know it was his, to have and to hold, now and forever.
“Stay just like that, pet,” Marcus said, making it clear he’d been doing his own appraisal. He put a knee up on the bed and then he was over Thomas, stretching his body out fully on him.
At first, Thomas hadn’t been entirely comfortable doing it this way, but Marcus wasn’t interested in his comfort in such situations. Thomas had learned to appreciate his way of shoving past his inhibitions. It was unnerving, how it shattered him every time to have Marcus take him face to face. Marcus slid his arms under Thomas’s legs, at the bend of Thomas’s knees. He guided himself into Thomas’s well lubed entry without the need of his hands, he knew his sub’s body that well.
That thick cock slid inch by excruciating inch into Thomas’s tight channel, eliciting a mutual grunt of deep satisfaction. Marcus braced himself against the backs of Thomas’s thighs, staring down at him with that firm mouth and penetrating eyes that refused to let Thomas look away.
“I love you, Master.” It rasped out of his throat, so obvious he couldn’t not say it.
Those green eyes flickered and the mouth softened. “Same goes, pet. Fuck, I missed you. I almost…but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.”
Thomas’s brow creased but Marcus was done talking. He started working harder in Thomas’s ass, and Thomas was already so close, he was holding on by fingernails. “Master, I’m going to come…if you keep…doing that.”
“Part of the plan. But hold out until I’m ready. Else I’ll beat you with a few more of your mother’s kitchen implements. Teach you to be a really…good…boy.”
Thomas groaned at each thrust punctuating the sentence. God, he couldn’t…yes, he would. He would. Oh no…fuck…he…
“Come for me, pet. Come now. Let me hear you.”
That wasn’t a problem, because the groan-shout that tore from Thomas’s throat couldn’t be withheld. The climax that seized him had him bucking up against Marcus, intensifying with every thrust. Marcus changed his angle so he had Thomas’s knees bent up tight on either side of Marcus’s body, pretty much lifting Thomas’s body all the way to the shoulders off the bed, Marcus’s thighs slapping against his ass as Thomas was penetrated over and over and over, those powerful lean muscles in Marcus’s body holding Thomas’s weight.
His cock jetted all over his stomach and chest. Damn, he’d probably gotten the pillows, wall and headboard. Daralyn really better not come until four tomorrow, because it was going to take him that long to restore all the good cleaning she’d done. But that was a vague thought, everything else spinning, wild color and gorgeous green eyes burning into his soul, the best kind of heat there was.
“There you are pet…easy now. There you are.”
He was shaking, something that happened every time Marcus took him over like this. The response never failed to please his Master, even though Thomas always felt unraveled afterward. But it was okay, because Marcus had a way of winding the spool again, as gentle in the aftermath as he could be ruthless during. When he slowly withdrew, Thomas shuddered. Marcus shifted them, curling around Thomas and cuddling him up into the coil of his taut frame. He was stroking Thomas’s hair, his shoulder, lips nuzzling his throat. Thomas groped behind him, found Marcus’s bare hip, gripped. Gripped hard.
“I love you.”
“So you said.” But the press of Marcus’s lips under Thomas’s ear lingered, his fingers stroking Thomas’s chest.
“I missed you,” Thomas added.
“I got that. I might have given you a thought or two.”
The tender jest made Thomas squeeze his eyes shut. Don’t talk about it. Let it go. This is enough. Don’t do that dumbass thing, talking about stupid shit during a vulnerable moment. This is enough.
“Thomas.” Marcus tugged him over onto his back, made him look up into his face as he leaned over him. He traced Thomas’s mouth with his thumb, his other fingers settling on his throat in that light collar that could liquefy Thomas’s will into water. He imagined a painting where he’d pour it over Marcus’s feet to wash them, just like a biblical act of obeisance. “Thomas,” Marcus repeated, drawing his attention out of that part of his head. His firm lips quirked, because he always knew when Thomas was painting. “Do you think I can’t read when you have something else on your mind?”
“You don’t want to hear it. And I don’t want…it’s stupid. Let’s just let it go.”
Marcus studied him. If he’d figured out what Thomas was thinking and said fine, we’ll let it go, rather than allowing Thomas to talk about it, Thomas knew that would hurt worse. Fuck, he was acting like a girl, wasn’t he?
“No,” Marcus said quietly at last. “We’re not letting it go. Let’s have it.” He flicked Thomas’s nipple, making Thomas jump. Thomas bit his lip, but when Marcus made something an order, he couldn’t keep the words from spilling out.
“I know you’ve had a lot of rough Christmases. I guess I hoped if you did stuff with me at Christmas…decorating, shopping, having a nice Christmas, it would help ease that. But it feels like you’re avoiding all that because instead it makes it worse. I know I’m being selfish, but I was really looking forward to sharing our first Christmas together, all of it. But if it’s not your thing, then you know, you could go back to New York and I could join you after Christmas with my family. Maybe we could do a trip somewhere that’s not about Christmas. Like the Bahamas or Josh’s island, until all the Christmas stuff is gone and done.”
“Would it
be easier to spend Christmas without me?” Marcus asked, his voice neutral.
“In your current mood, yes. But no. Because easier doesn’t mean better. I’m starting to get what the better or worse thing means. I’d rather spend my worse day in the world with you than the best day without you. Because it wouldn’t be the best day if you weren’t there. I just…I feel like we’re making one another miserable, me wanting you to do Christmas shit, and you so not wanting to do it.”
“So you’re trying to figure out how to make it easier for me.” Marcus studied him another moment and then sighed. Rolling away from Thomas, he shifted to a sitting position, facing away from Thomas to brace his hands on either side of himself. Though the silken feathering of Marcus’s dark hair concealed his profile, Thomas could tell he was staring out the window at the back fields. “Thomas, there really isn’t a way to do that.”
“I know.” Even though it hurt like hell to acknowledge it, to hear Marcus say it. “I just wish…”
He wanted to reach out, stroke the bare line of Marcus’s back. And he wanted to be closer. So to hell with it. He sat up and traced Marcus’s back to his hip, curled his fingers over it. All the while sliding closer, until he had his thighs parted so he could press himself right up against Marcus’s back, replete cock and testicles mashed against Marcus’s ass, Thomas’s legs framing his hips and Marcus’s thighs, the soles of Thomas’s feet dangling just above the floor on either side. He threaded his arms under Marcus’s so he could put one around his chest, the other around his waist. Marcus’s breathing was evening out from their rough fucking, but there was a stillness to him as Thomas completed the full embrace, putting his chin on his Master’s shoulder, using his jaw to hold back some of that gorgeous dark hair, see his face fully.
“You know, at first I wasn’t comfortable with positions like this. You nurturing, surrounding me.”
“I know.”
“Then, one day, I wondered why I’d ever resisted it.” Marcus lifted a hand, closed it over Thomas’s on his chest, even as he continued to stare out the window. “I’m your Master, Thomas, but there’s a comfort and safe feeling to your love that I never realized I needed so much, not until you started exercising it with such marvelous consistency.”
Thomas lifted his face, startled, but Marcus wasn’t done. He cocked his head, his gaze and tone sharpening. “I don’t ever want you to dismiss your needs, do you understand? I’ll do more than blister your ass if you do. This works because you don’t retreat an inch from who you want to be with me. You’ve been down that road, remember?” He glanced down meaningfully. “That ulcer is now under control. You do shit like that which sets it off, you and I are going to have a real problem.”
Thomas swallowed, nodded. “But I…”
Marcus tightened his fingers over Thomas’s. “The Christmas thing is no different from holding me like this. You need to keep pushing what you want. Telling me what you want. Telling me when I’m hurting you. I knew I was hurting you, which makes me ashamed of it, but it’s when you call me on it that I have to face it and deal with it. My outside may be perfect, but the inside is a troll. You know that.”
Thomas’s heart wrenched at the matter-of-fact comment. He shifted his other arm so they were both around Marcus’s chest and gave him a hard, admonishing squeeze. “No. I don’t. And I don’t want you to do that, either. You’re all perfect to me. Even when you’re a horse’s ass, you’re a perfect horse’s ass.”
Marcus snorted, a half-chuckle. Another tender feeling speared Thomas’s middle as Marcus sighed and relaxed, letting them stay in this position, bodies leaned into one another.
“I’m sorry. I should have been helping you more with Christmas. It didn’t matter for so long, you know. Usually at Christmas I did the party rounds, business functions, friend stuff where nothing got too personal, and then I’d go home, go to sleep, get up to a new not-Christmas day and it didn’t matter. It matters this year, which reminds me of the few Christmases where it did matter, but it didn’t go so well.”
“I know.” Thomas brushed Marcus’s throat with his mouth. Then his shoulder as Marcus’s chest expanded under his grip in another sigh. With their bodies pressed together like this, it felt like more than their flesh was bare. “I’ve tried not to push. I want to know anything you want to tell me. Actually, I really want to know all of it, because that seems to help you.”
“Yeah, I know. Doesn’t mean it comes easy. Maybe later, pet. It’s just…” Marcus blew out a breath and rose, pulling out of Thomas’s hold. He found his shorts and slacks, pulled them on, hooked the slacks, zipped, though he stripped the belt so they stayed low on his hips, an irresistible look that usually caused Thomas’s senses to glaze over. Marcus pushed his hand through his thick hair, the strands waterfalling over his bare shoulder. “Did you get me a Christmas present? We said no buying presents this first year.”
“I did not buy you a Christmas present,” Thomas said truthfully. Marcus shot him a narrow look, but there was something behind his expression, an almost desperate, hunted look that had Thomas wanting to rise and go to him, but Marcus changed the subject. He gestured out the bedroom door, in the direction of the living room. “It all looks great. You haven’t hung the garland on the porch yet, though.”
“No.”
“Well, let’s do that. Maybe you can tell me why you picked out some of the ornaments you did. I…” He cleared his throat. “I’ll be right back. You can get dressed.”
He strode from the room. Thomas retrieved his clothes. As he pulled them on, moved into the living room, he saw through the windows Marcus had headed out the door to his car. He pulled out his computer and overnight bag, a gift bag from Macy’s, and came back onto the porch. Thomas listened to the comforting squeak of the screen, the sound of Marcus’s feet in the entrance hallway, the thump as Marcus dropped his luggage there. They were Thomas’s favorite combination of sounds when Marcus returned from a trip where Thomas couldn’t accompany him. That thought filled his heart as Marcus stepped back into the living room, and Thomas had to quell an entirely sentimental desire to go embrace Marcus again.
Instead he watched Marcus gaze at the tree, absorbing the details for perhaps the very first time. He took his time with it, as Marcus did when examining any type of artistic arrangement. After a long moment, a light smile tugged his firm mouth, and that warm feeling grew. “It really is beautiful, Thomas. You did a great job with it. But there are a few branches bare.”
Marcus pulled a box out of the Macy’s bag, extended it. “I didn’t know if they would go with what you’d done, but red goes with everything at Christmas, right? I liked them, and thought you would as well. It’s one of their guest glass designers who does special holiday collections. Oh, and I picked up a few additional things for your family.”
So though they hadn’t bought gifts together, Marcus had still helped provide surprises for the family. “That’s great,” Thomas said. Despite his reaction to what was in the box, he kept his tone just as deliberately casual as Marcus was trying so hard to do. The box held four red glass ornaments, glass balls in various spherical and oblong shapes.
“These are really nice,” Thomas said sincerely, his throat a little thick. Marcus had made an effort, even before anything was said about his heretofore lack of one. It could have been plastic balls from the Dollar Store for all Thomas cared. His Master was so rarely uncertain except in this area of their lives, so he had no idea how much Thomas treasured every step he made, trusting Thomas’s approval and love to care for him in those unknown rooms.
Reaching out, he touched his Master’s face, then let the hand trail to his bare chest, resting his palm on Marcus’s chest. Thump. Thump. That steady beat that meant so much to him. “Hang them with me?”
Marcus nodded, his expression neutral, but Thomas thought he was pleased with Thomas’s reaction to the ornaments. “Let me get some hooks for them,” Thomas added.
As he went to fish them out of the storage bo
x he hadn’t yet put away, the mistletoe hanging over the door caught his eye, reminding him. “Oh, I planted the idea in Daralyn’s head she should kiss Rory under the mistletoe.”
“Did she faint?”
“Nope. She blushed.” Thomas straightened, hooks in hand. “Based on the way the conversation went, it’s pretty clear you’re right about her. Not so much like me, though.”
“No. And what she needs isn’t like me, either.” On more familiar ground now, Marcus slid his hands in the pockets of his slacks as he watched Thomas put the box down on a chair and thread the hooks into the ornament eyelets. “What she went through with her father and uncle, they pretty much trained her to be a sub from day one and, horrible as the circumstances were, that’s what she knows, her comfort zone. She can turn a curse into a blessing, because I’ve seen subs find their own strength and identity under a Dom’s command in a way they can't do it otherwise. Think Rory has some of me in him?”
Thomas chuckled. “He’d faint at the thought. For her, I think it’s more homegrown, innate, if that makes sense. She’s not the kind of submissive that’s going to be going to a club. And definitely not the kind that likes…pain.”
“Like you do and need at times,” Marcus supplied, with an intent, heated look. “The fact it still embarrasses you makes me want to apply it all the more often. How is that fine ass that belongs to me, by the way? Sore?”
“You know it is,” Thomas managed with dignity. Despite the gleam in Marcus’s eye, he returned to the question at hand. “Before his accident, Rory was an alpha, no question. Captain of the varsity team in two sports, that kind of thing. His confidence in himself is growing to the point he could reclaim that part of who he is. But alpha isn’t necessarily a Dom. I don’t really get a Dom vibe off him, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there. He’s my brother. You tend to block any sexual vibes from a sibling.”
“Even in North Carolina?”
Thomas bared his teeth at him and Marcus grinned. “Regardless, an alpha can enjoy exercising Dom tendencies under the right circumstances since there are a lot of overlapping traits,” he said. “As you said, this is less about restraints and spanking and more about giving her the safety that being under someone’s command can provide. Do you think he could do that?”
