Once Burned

by L. A. Witt

  And I remembered all too well what had happened last time I’d bent—but refused to break—my rule. I’d let things go too far emotionally with Dalton, and we’d broken up before we got in over our heads. Except the deep, burning regret I’d had afterward told me I’d already been in over my head, and letting go of him had been a mistake.

  I wasn’t pining after Dalton anymore. I was glad he had Chris, and I knew they’d be happy together. Sometimes, though, I caught myself wondering if he was the one who got away. If I’d let something special slip through my fingers.

  Maybe Mark was another shot at getting it right.

  If I could get past all my own shit with the Navy.

  I always looked forward to my one weekend off a month, but never like this. Usually I’d spend it with Dalton—and Chris if he wasn’t at work—or just be lazy. If there was football on, I’d watch it at home.

  Tomorrow, I’d be watching the game on Mark’s impressive big-screen.

  Tonight, we were going out dancing. I couldn’t even remember the last time someone had wanted to go dancing. When I was in my twenties, yeah. As I crawled through my thirties, the men I’d dated hadn’t really been into that scene. And I could do without it, but some nights, it was just fun to cut loose under some disco lights, especially if I was with someone who liked it too.

  It wasn’t that I didn’t like going to clubs to meet guys. My pickup game wasn’t bad, and I’d had some seriously hot hookups in men’s rooms, parking lots, and strangers’ beds, but the thrill of the hunt got old. Sometimes I liked dancing to relax, and it was not relaxing to be concentrating on picking up a guy. I liked going to the club with the same man I’d be going to bed with later. That way I could enjoy the dancing instead of concentrating on getting someone’s attention.

  At least we were staying someplace cheap tonight, and Mark hadn’t pushed about why money was so tight. It had been bad enough admitting I lived paycheck to paltry paycheck, but it was less embarrassing than admitting I didn’t technically get a paycheck. Just tips. Those details could come out later if we kept doing this.

  Mark volunteered to drive too, and I didn’t argue. My piece-of-shit truck ran most of the time, but whenever I took it more than fifty miles out of town, I’d spend the whole trip back praying it wouldn’t crap out on the side of the road. The only thing I had to worry about this time was if I could add a few gallons of gas to what I’d already budgeted for the weekend.

  Fuck it, I decided before we’d even left the Anchor Point city limits. I hadn’t spent too much recently—aside from a couple of indulgent visits to the café—and I hadn’t been out to have a good time in ages. As long as we didn’t do this every weekend I had off, I’d be fine.

  The passenger seat of his Lexus was cushy and comfortable, and there was a ton of room to stretch out my legs. Awesome. Especially since there was already a twinge in my knee letting me know I’d be limping tomorrow if I danced tonight. And I was dancing tonight.

  On the way out of town, Mark asked, “So you’ve been to the clubs down there?”

  I nodded. “I don’t go very often, but yeah.”

  “You don’t get tired of it?” He glanced at me. “After you spend hours on end at the High-&-Tight?”

  “It’s not really the same scene. And I’m having fun instead of working.”

  “True. I’m surprised working there doesn’t make you turn up your nose at clubs, though.” He rested his elbow on the console and his other hand on top of the wheel. “When I worked at Burger King as a kid, I couldn’t go near any fast food chain.”

  “Yeah, but clubs don’t smell like fry grease.”

  “Fair point.”

  I watched him for a moment. “Why can’t I picture you flipping burgers?”

  Mark laughed. “I did it for three years. Took me almost ten to be able to eat a burger again.”

  I grimaced and shuddered. “No, thanks.”

  “Yeah, it wasn’t fun. But I was a teenager, so . . .” He shrugged.

  We drove on in silence for a minute or two before I said, “How do you like Anchor Point so far?”

  “No complaints so far. Not like I’ve seen very much of it yet. Just the base, the High-&-Tight, and . . . you.” He glanced at me and grinned. “So like I said, no complaints.”

  “Hey, you have plenty of time to explore the town between when you get off work and when I do.”

  “Uh-huh. Except that’s the time I have to use for menial things like grocery shopping, cleaning the house, and doing laundry.”

  I waved a hand. “Those aren’t important.”

  “Of course they’re not. Eh, I’ll get out and explore it eventually. I’m probably going to be here a while.”

  “Yeah? How long?”

  “Don’t know. The boat just moved here, so it’s not going anywhere. Well, besides deploying. It’s not going to a new home port, I mean. And if the upper chain of command gets shuffled around again, the rear admiral will probably blow a gasket. So, I could probably stay here until I retire.”

  That piqued my interest even as I tried not to get twitchy over the conversation turning to the military. “When do you think you’ll retire?”

  “Oh hell, I have no idea. Three months ago, I was going to retire next year. Now . . .” He shook his head. “I’m still getting my bearings now, so I haven’t really thought about it. But since I just made rank, there’s no point in retiring until I’ve been in long enough to retire at captain’s pay instead of commander’s. And if I stick around three or four years for that, I might as well stick it out for ten and retire at thirty.”

  I fought to keep my disappointment from showing. Ten more years? Jesus. “And you might stay in Anchor Point that whole time?”

  “Maybe.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I didn’t know why I bothered feeling disappointed. The man had just put on captain and uprooted his life to come here. Of course he wasn’t retiring anytime soon. And staying until thirty meant three-quarter retirement pay instead of half. Sounded like a no-brainer to me.

  Must be nice to have the opportunity to stay in that long.

  I bit back my own bitterness. None of my situation was Mark’s fault. I was happy he’d been successful in the Navy, and he deserved whatever retirement he eventually took.

  It was Mark’s turn to break the silence. “So, what’s the plan when we get to Flatstick?”

  “Check into the room, right?”

  “I mean after that.”

  “Probably get dinner or something.” I grinned. “Then we dance, we fuck like bunnies, and we go back to your place so we can watch my Eagles crush your Cardinals.”

  He smirked. “Uh-huh. We’ll see about that.” He put his hand on my thigh and ran his thumb along the outer seam of my jeans. “You have a Sunday off, and it’s the Sunday our teams play each other.” He glanced at me. “Kinda sounds like we’re meant to watch that game together.”

  I laughed. “Almost like divine intervention.”

  “Almost, yeah.” He cut his eyes toward me. “And come Sunday, you and your Eagles are gonna need some divine intervention.”

  “Oh, ha ha. Fuck you.”

  We exchanged glances, and I elbowed him.

  Divine intervention. Pfft. We’d see about that.

  We pulled into Flatstick around seven. The row of clubs was at the outer edge of town, but we didn’t head there quite yet. Instead, he drove us closer to the beach, where the tourists usually clustered. I’d made him promise to get someplace cheap, and my gut clenched every time we went near something that might be expensive.

  Then he parked in front of what looked like an old house. Victorian, maybe?

  Flatstick Bed & Breakfast.

  “A B&B?” I asked. I could almost feel my budget going up in smoke.

  “Believe it or not,” Mark said as he turned off the engine, “this was the cheapest place in town.” He paused. “Well, aside from the two motels that had multiple TripAdvisor reviews mentioning black mold.”r />
  I grimaced. Okay, I could accept skipping the cheapest places if they had mold problems. “But this isn’t really expensive, is it?”

  “No, not at all.” He smiled. “I promise, it isn’t.” He nodded toward the building. “And breakfast is included, so why not?”

  I looked up at the big, extravagant house, and my panic slowly receded. “Okay, fair enough.”

  He patted my leg. “Come on. Let’s go check in.”

  Our room was so cutesy it made my teeth hurt. There was a giant lace doily on the table by the door with a pastel-pink vase full of pastel-pink flowers, which matched the pastel-pink walls, comforter, and picture frames. The sheer pinkness of the place probably scared off any black mold that tried to show up.

  Mark put his bag on the bed. “I’m almost afraid to fuck in here.”

  I looked at him, eyes wide. “What? Why?”

  He smirked. “Kind of feels like screwing in my grandma’s house.”

  “What? You’ve never screwed in your grandma’s house?”

  Mark shot me a horrified look. “Have you?”

  “Not in your grandma’s house, no.”

  The longer he stared at me, the harder it was to keep a straight face. When my lip twitched, he rolled his eyes, and we both laughed.

  “You’re a dork,” he said.

  I just chuckled and dropped my overnight bag beside his on the bed. “Should we get ready to go out?”

  Mark checked the time on his phone. “Want to get dinner first?”

  “Good idea.”

  After a light dinner in town, we came back to the pink palace and started getting ready to go to the club. We didn’t dare shower together or we’d never leave the room, and I wanted to get Mark spun up on the dance floor before we wound up in bed together.

  I took a shower, and while he took his, I pulled on a pair of boxers. Before I got dressed, though, I took the black knee brace out of my overnight bag. I scowled at the thing. It wasn’t all that comfortable, but it beat the alternative.

  I wasn’t fast enough. Before I’d put my jeans on, Mark stepped out of the bathroom, and his gaze went straight to the black nylon wrapped around my knee. Concern instantly creased his forehead. “Leg bothering you?”

  “Not as long as I wear this, no.” I smoothed a Velcro strap into place. “This and some Motrin, and I’ll be good for the night.” That wasn’t entirely true. It was already aching, and it would be throbbing like a bitch by the time we left the club. The brace and the ibuprofen would just keep it bearable.

  And then I noticed the question in his eyes. Oh shit.

  “It’s just an old injury,” I said quickly. “Standing all the time at work aggravates it. That’s all.”

  “You’re still okay going out, though?” He searched my eyes. “If you want to take it easy tonight, we—”

  I kissed him and, for good measure, squeezed his ass through the thin towel he was wearing. He whimpered softly against my lips.

  “I want to go out,” I purred, “and then we’re going to come back here so I can fuck you.” I nipped his lower lip. “My knee can handle it. Question is—can you?”

  Mark shivered hard. “Oh yeah. I can handle it.”

  “Mm-hmm. Prove it.”

  “Let me finish getting ready,” he murmured against my lips, “and I will.”

  The club was darker than the High-&-Tight. Disco lights threw bright colors over every surface, but that was about it besides the backlit bottles glowing behind the bar.

  This place was bigger and definitely more crowded too. Diego had said something about people coming from as far as Salem and Portland to dance here, which was crazy since Portland had its own thriving gay scene. On the other hand, I supposed it was a good place to go if someone wanted to dance and hook up but wasn’t out in their own town. Either way, the club was crawling with people and it wasn’t even nine o’clock yet.

  “So.” Diego turned to me, multicolored lights fluttering over his features. “Want to do a shot before we hit the dance floor?”

  “Just one,” I said. “Or I really will hit the floor.”

  He laughed as he snaked an arm around my waist. “You’re not that much of a lightweight, are you?”

  “Depends on what we’re shooting.”

  “So, no tequila?”

  “No.”

  He flashed a grin, teeth lighting up under the black lights and giving him an almost demonic look. “Come on.” He tugged me with him. “And I promise, no tequila.”

  At the bar, he shouted an order over the music. I couldn’t hear him, but the bartender arranged a pair of shot glasses on the bar and started filling them with rum and a couple of colorful liqueurs I couldn’t identify.

  Diego paid for the shots—he’d insisted on the way here—and handed one to me. He clinked the tiny glass against mine, gave me a loaded wink, and pounded the shot. I hesitated, not because I didn’t want the drink but because I was too mesmerized by him to remember what to do with it. It came to me, though, and I threw mine back, grimacing at the intense burn. There was a mix of flavors—mostly sweet with a hint of something spicy—but it went down too fast for me to catch more than the alcohol taste.

  “What the fuck was that?” I asked, eyeing my empty glass.

  “A Portland Pounder.”

  “And that is . . . ?”

  Diego winked. “Booze. What more do you want?”

  “Fair point.”

  “Should we do another? And then . . .?” He nodded toward the dance floor.

  I grinned. “Let’s do it.”

  We did one more round of shots, and then Diego led me by the hand out onto the dance floor. And just like that, we were dancing.

  Okay, I was trying to dance. I hadn’t done this in years, but that wasn’t why I struggled to coordinate my body to the beat. It was this man in front of me.

  He moved easily and fluidly in time with the music. There wasn’t an ounce of self-consciousness in his movements or his expression, and even without the black lights making his teeth glow, his broad smile would have lit up the whole room.

  I hadn’t noticed until it was gone, but most of the time, Diego carried a lot of stress and worry in his face. Deep crevices. Visible tension. The tightness of his jaw. The creases in his forehead.

  Right now, all that was gone. Maybe it was the music, or maybe it was that shot he’d done at the bar. Whatever it was, I didn’t want it to stop. Not tonight. Not ever.

  Tell me what it takes to make you smile like this, and I’ll do it forever.

  I didn’t care that it was ridiculous to think about things like forever when I barely knew him and my divorce was still in the works. When I was in no position to think beyond next week. And really, I wasn’t thinking about forever. Not the real forever. Just the kind of forever that seemed possible when I was happy and high and couldn’t help wishing the night would never end. When it didn’t matter that drinking, dancing, and partying weren’t things that could be sustained for more than a few hours, especially after the age of forty. By the time the sun came up, I’d be passed out and sleeping like the dead, but right now, I was ten feet tall and bulletproof, and how long had it been since I’d felt like this?

  Diego danced closer, gave me a wink, and then turned his back. For a few flickers of the disco lights, I was disappointed I couldn’t see his face anymore, but then he was against me. Leaning into me. Moving with me. Before I knew what was happening, my hands were on his hips. Almost in his front pockets. Suddenly I had no trouble keeping time with the music. Diego was like a conduit between me and the speakers—the rhythm flowed like electricity from his body to mine, and we ground and rubbed, and my head spun as the music carried us away.

  It wasn’t like some pantomime of when we had sex. This was totally different. Here, in our clothes on the dance floor, orgasms were off the table. There was nothing to do but move together and absorb each other’s body heat. Oh, I’d be making him come later on, but right now, it was all about how in sy
nc we were. How our bodies just seemed to fit together and move together and—

  Okay, maybe it was a little like when we were in bed. But different too. Unique and familiar, and hot either way. It didn’t matter. It was hot, and it was addictive, and how are you here with me of all people?

  Diego tilted his head back, and his lips brushed my cheek as he said over the music, “You know, I think we’re the oldest guys here.”

  I scanned the room, and . . . yeah. I was pretty sure he was right. At least half this crowd probably still thought thirty was old.

  It didn’t make me self-conscious, though. So what if we didn’t blend in? We’d come here to dance, and I’d all but forgotten there was anyone here at all until Diego’d said something. Hell, I didn’t care if everyone here was half our age. Diego and I might have been old men a little to the right and left of forty, but we could still hold our own. We’d still be fucking like rabbits when we made it back to our hotel. The younger guys could have each other—my libido was completely focused on him.

  A few songs later, we took a break and found a table near the edge of the room. I pretended not to notice Diego limping slightly, and he didn’t seem to notice me gingerly rubbing the small of my back.

  “I’ll go get us some water,” he panted. “Be right back.”

  I was about to stop him and suggest I go so he could rest his leg, but he was already gone. I watched him on his way to the bar. His limp wasn’t as pronounced as I’d thought. In fact, I was pretty sure it was less out of pain and more because of the restrictive brace he was wearing under his jeans. I just hoped it was keeping the joint stable and his knee didn’t ruin his evening.

  At the bar, Diego had barely flagged down the bartender before a twentysomething blond sidled up to him with a grin. From the way he smiled while he talked, he was obviously flirting. Diego seemed like he was being polite even as he shook his head. The come on, are you sure? was unmistakable, but Diego shook his head again and nodded toward me. As he did, I swore his mouth formed the word boyfriend.