Devious Resolutions

by Ashleigh Giannoccaro

  “We don’t have to live there permanently. I mean, we could always come back here after a little while. I’ve built a life there. I have a job, and—”

  “You don’t have to explain yourself to me. I just wanted to know that you’re in this with me. I don’t like people, I never have. But you . . .”

  “I know.” I smile, nodding when he looks at me with a smirk that reminds me of all the times we would run away and hide in their backyard away from other kids. Even away from his folks and their friends they would invite over.

  “But for you, I’ll do it.” This time when he looks at me, there’s something so deep, so purely broken in his gaze that it tugs at my chest. Rounding the counter, I nudge my way between his thick, muscled thighs and lock my arms around his neck.

  “You’re beautiful,” I tell him. Leaning in, my lips brush against his, and my cock hardens when he groans in pleasure. The sound is like an aphrodisiac, and I’m dying to rip his clothes off, to see his body, to lick and taste every inch.

  “You’re fucking hard.” Max grins, his hand finding my crotch, gently stroking me through the material of my sweatpants, earning himself a groan. It doesn’t take me long to harden fully and for Max to drop to his knees before me. I want to stop him because I always wanted to do this for him first, but he doesn’t allow me to as he tugs at the waistband of my pants. Once the material is at my thighs, my cock juts out, hard and ready. Max grips my shaft in his rough hand.

  I’d only ever fantasized about this moment. Since I was old enough to have these feelings, it was Max who was the star of the show, of my wettest, wildest dreams. It was always him.

  When his tongue sneaks out and laps at me, the soft groan of pleasure that rockets from deep within my core is nothing compared to the moan that he elicits when he takes me into his hot, wet mouth. He doesn’t waste time to swallow me down as if he’s done this before.

  Jealousy, desire, and need swirl together in a potent mixture, and my knees just about give way. I don’t want him to have done this before. With anyone. I’m dragged from my thoughts by the slurping sound of Maxen’s mouth working around the head of my dick, making me smile, and I can’t help but tangle my fingers in his hair, tugging him closer, fucking his mouth.

  His throat hums around my shaft, the sensation sending sparks through me, and I can’t stop the feral grunt that falls from my lips. My eyes roll back, my fingers tighten as I grip his hair, tangling the strands, and I’m sure I’m hurting him, but I can’t stop myself.

  When Max finally pulls away from me, his dark eyes meet mine, desire swimming in them, and I tug him up to crash my mouth to his. Our tongues fight a duel for more, to be closer to each other. His hands roam my chest, down my arms and toward my ass, squeezing it almost painfully.

  “I’m going to fuck you, so hard, so fucking violently, you’re never going to need another man inside you again,” he promises against my lips. I don’t wait for him to say anything more.

  “Make me forget everything.”

  “Tell me what happened,” he forces the issue. His voice is a low, feral growl, and I know I have to give him something.

  My eyes lock on his, meeting the dark orbs that seem endless. My mouth moves before I have time to stop the words from falling from my lips.

  “They pinned me down. They made me tell them I was a fag. And when they made me bleed, they laughed and told me I was worth nothing more than being left to die on the floor of the toilets.” The pain in my chest grips me, stealing my breath, but Max’s lips are on mine as he whispers it’s okay over and over.

  The words feather over my mouth, his breath becoming mine as I allow the tears to linger on my lashes. I don’t want to cry about the past anymore. It’s behind me. And Max is here, in front of me. It’s time to move forward.

  My hands are on his belt buckle, tugging at it eagerly as he grins at me like he’s just found out my secret. But he knew how much I wanted him before that moment he walked out. We’re hands and mouths as I pull at his tee, shoving his boxer briefs down along with the jeans he’s wearing.

  Maxen’s dark chuckle vibrates through his chest. “And that’s why I sliced both of them limb from limb.”

  His confession stills all my movements. “What?” I pin him with a stare, trying to read his mind, to gauge if he’s joking or not. But the look he offers back tells me he’s not lying.

  “I’ve always loved you. And I’d do anything for you. But that’s a story for another night. We’re bringing in the New Year connected to each other.”

  As tears sting my eyes, I realize I want nothing more than to feel his skin on mine. And it doesn’t take long before I do. The heat of him sears me; it’s beautiful and intoxicating. I want every moment of this to last, but it ends too soon. Maxen turns me around, his cock slipping between the cheeks of my ass.

  “Do you want it rough and hard, or would you like me to make love to you?” His voice is dark and dangerous, with a hint of need that drips from every syllable. His hands trail my spine, moving over each and every inch of me until he reaches my ass.

  I turn to regard him over my shoulder. My gaze locking with his. “I want you, any way I can get you, Max,” I tell him honestly.

  Fingers squeeze me, holding me open to his gaze, and I watch as he drops down behind me, the heat of his breath feathering along my body, and in the next second, I have to grip onto something because his tongue darts out. He licks me from bottom to top and back again.

  My toes curl as pleasure zips through me, and all I can do to keep from coming is to focus on the way he’s growling behind me. But Max has other plans because he doesn’t stop. His mouth taunts me with pleasure beyond anything I ever thought I’d experience.

  He doesn’t wait for me to respond before he rises, spits down onto the tight ring of muscle, and then I feel him nudging me. His cock at my entrance, seeking to pass.

  “Tell me no,” he grunts as he feels me relax. It’s the only way I can show him that I want more, and soon enough, the blunt head of his shaft slips into me, causing a whimper of pained pleasure to fall from my mouth. “This is what you dreamed of?” he questions as he slides into me, the pain searing through me as I stretch around him, taking him deeper into my body.

  “Always,” I mumble, my nails digging into the wood of the counter before me. His body moves with mine, molded to me, his hands on my hips, his cock deep inside me, and I can’t help but feel whole for the first time in my life.

  We’re connected. We’re here, together, and I know he’ll never leave me again.

  “Fuck me, Max,” I plead, needing the pain and pleasure and the release of finally feeling him mark me from the inside. His hips pull back, and the way his cock slides from me then slams back in shoves me into the edge of the countertop.

  My body is his, and with every thrust, I allow myself to feel him, to really feel him down to my soul.

  “Fuck, you’re so tight.”

  “And you’re so fucking big,” I bite out as he drives into me, balls-deep in my ass. His hands grip my cheeks and spreads me open to his gaze. The heat of him staring at me makes my body quake with desire that’s so violent I feel myself on the edge of release.

  Chapter Six

  Maxen

  His body is perfection, and I can’t move. We’re still connected, his body tight around mine.

  Reaching around, I grip his cock and jerk it a few times before I feel him pulse around me, and stickiness coats my hand. His ass grips my shaft like a vise, milking me for all I’m worth, and I don’t stop moving until I feel sated.

  My skin is hot, sweaty, and Kasen’s smooth flesh sticks to me as if we can never part, but I know it’s all a lie. It has to be, because I don’t know how else to do this. I have two choices — send him on his way, or kill him.

  The latter is not a choice. I can’t. Pulling slowly out of him, I don’t miss the wince on his face when I disconnect our bodies. He needed this as much as I hungered for it.

  “Are you stay
ing here tonight?” I ask, knowing my aloofness might hurt him. Perhaps I can scare him off just by being an asshole. It didn’t work before, but this might just do it.

  Kasen straightens, turns toward me, and his gaze lands on mine. There’s love and affection in his stare, which unnerves me. I can’t deal with feelings; he should know this. I couldn’t deal with it years ago, and I can’t deal with it now.

  I allow my gaze to trail over him, taking in every inch of toned flesh. The chiseled abs I came to know as a teenager. The dips and peaks that I remember him working hard to form, greet me in a shimmering, sweaty temptation, and my mouth waters.

  “Are you chasing me away?” His challenge is clear; he wants me to make a choice. He’s always been intelligent, and this time, he’s outplayed me.

  Even though I haven’t had many men in my bed before, they’ve all been easily distracted, leaving when I needed them to. But I should’ve known Kase would be different. I should’ve been prepared, but nothing in this world would’ve had me ready to meet the man I love again.

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because you’re incapable of love,” he taunts once more, and I’m tempted to punch him, grip his throat and choke the truth out of him. He doesn’t recall the moment our lives changed, not properly. I wish he remembered. I prayed for years that he’d recall why I walked out. I thought he knew, but it’s clear he never did.

  “You need to stop living with stars in your eyes,” I bite out, stalking into the living room, where I find an empty tumbler and quickly fill it with amber alcohol.

  He doesn’t respond, but I don’t expect him to. I’m being a dick, and it’s what he needs to move on, to find someone who can love him in the way I can’t.

  Silence hangs heavily in the darkness. The moon slowly peeks through heavy clouds, and the silver light finally shimmers through the windows. I can’t move when Kasen comes closer. I can feel his body heat against me. My lungs don’t pull in air, and my heart decides it’s time to slam against my chest like a fucking captive.

  “You can’t push me away,” he tells me. “All this time, all these years, I know you’re hurting, and it’s time you look me in the eye and confess what you’re feeling.”

  I want to punch something, slice it, kill it, make it squirm under me as I steal its life. That thing is my best friend. But I don’t move because I know the moment I do, he’ll see what I’m thinking. Kasen has always been intuitive, he’s always known me inside and out, and I’m certain this time it wouldn’t be any different than the times before.

  “Go to bed.”

  “Why?”

  I don’t know how to respond, so I don’t. Instead, I focus on my drink, pouring another double shot before I swallow it down and wince at the burn that trickles its way down my throat.

  “Because I fucking said so,” I grit through clenched teeth, slamming the tumbler on the wooden countertop of the bar so hard it shatters in my hand, causing blood to spurt from the cuts in my fingers.

  “Are you always going to be such an asshole?” Kasen bites out, his hands on his hips, and there’s something incredibly erotic about the way he’s standing, how his thick cock is still half-mast even in anger.

  Jesus, how can he be so hot, so fucking sexy?

  “Yes, I’ll always be an asshole, even when I’m old and gray, because the moment I allow emotion to steal me like it has you, I’ll be weak.”

  Fire burns in Kasen’s gaze as he stalks to me. Once we’re inches apart, cocks touching, bodies once again burning for each other, my best friend pins me with a glare so fierce I can’t breathe.

  “No, Max, you’re weak because you allow pain to settle in here,” he sneers as he prods my chest with his index finger. “Being strong is fighting, it’s living, it’s fucking feeling, and you feel nothing. Which fucking makes you weak.”

  Once he’s done with his admission, he spins on his heel and leaves me in the living room staring after him. The door slamming, the lock clicking is the only evidence that there’s someone else in my cabin. Other than that, there’s nothing of Kasen’s here, unless you count my chest that’s now smarting from his accusation. I may not admit it to his face, but he’s right.

  Leaning back in the small chair that sits near the bed, I watch him sleep. I gulp down another shot of bourbon, before glancing at the gun still lying on the table. I should just kill him, but I’m not sure I’m capable. Not when he looks at me like he loves me.

  I want to claim him. But how can I when I’m broken and tortured? He doesn’t know what I did. The moment I found out, I made sure to set a plan in motion that would end my father’s life. Kasen doesn’t know what happened. He doesn’t know what I did for him.

  Maybe it’s best that I leave him to live a normal life, but deep down, I know after we connected, there’s no way I can walk. His toned body tangled in the sheets under the dim light that shimmers through the window catches my attention. He looks beautiful just lying there naked. The roundness of his ass, along with his toned, muscled legs make my mouth water to have another taste.

  Reaching for my gun, I lift it, pointing it at him. My one eye closes, the other trained on my mark. He doesn’t move. He doesn’t realize I could pull the trigger and end him.

  Just like I killed my father.

  I allowed my mother to believe she was guilty. I even let Kasen think he was the one who did it. But they don’t realize just how fucked up I truly am.

  “I wish you’d just do it,” Kasen’s gravelly voice comes from the bed. He doesn’t turn to look at me, but it’s as if he can see the gun in my hand. He knew the moment he stepped foot through the cabin door that I wasn’t the boy that walked out of his room that day.

  I have changed.

  I’ve become a man.

  A broken one.

  “Do you want me to do it?” I question, pushing off the chair and stalking toward the bed. My shadow falls over Kasen’s naked form, his toned muscles in the darkness, and I miss seeing them. I can devour him with my eyes; just looking at him sometimes hurts.

  “It would be better than having you hate me,” he tells me. “It’s enough I live with guilt and shame every day.” It sounds as if he’s about to admit something to me. Perhaps he’s going to tell me what happened when I left. I should’ve known it would happen when I walked out. Nobody was safe in that small shithole we grew up in.

  “Why would I hate you?”

  He’s silent for a long while, and I wonder if he’s ever going to tell me. Deep down, I pray he’ll confess all those things that happened. Perhaps if it’s out in the world, it would be better for us both. But knowing my best friend, he’ll keep it locked up tight. And it’s not because he’s trying to hide something from me. He believes he’s keeping me safe.

  Safety is a lie. It’s a mirage that people believe in; I don’t buy it. It doesn’t matter who you’re with, you can never truly be protected. The only time you’re sheltered is if you’re alone. Which is why I left. In my mind, I was convinced it would stop if I wasn’t there.

  I crawl up onto the bed. My knees on either side of Kasen. His head turned to the side with his gaze locked on the window. He looks dead already. Perhaps inside, he is. Maybe his soul is no longer alive.

  He’s feeling what I do. He knows it, and I do too. Trailing the barrel of the gun over his spine, I revel in the tension that’s locked his muscles in his shoulders. The beautiful peaks and valleys of his smooth, tanned flesh make my cock hard.

  I want to fuck him again. To feel him deep inside. I want him to cry out my name, to moan as I pleasure him. I want to fuck every person he’s ever been with, out of him. The gun stops at the crack of his toned ass, inches from my now-hard cock.

  “Max,” he grits through clenched teeth, causing me to glance up at his face. His jaw ticks. I can tell he’s both turned on and nervous. Just like me. I’ve only ever done this once before, and that didn’t end well.

  Mind you, the point was to kill the fucker.

  I
wonder if she found him like I left him.

  Did she know?

  Gripping my cock, I stroke it slowly while watching as Kasen’s muscles tense and release. He knows I’m going to fuck him again. His hips lift ever so slightly, an invitation to take him how I need him.

  “Max, please,” he begs, making my cock jolt with need. I shift down to his thighs, setting the gun down beside us. I grip the cheeks of his ass, opening him, dribbling spit over the tight hole that’s needy for me. I circle it, massaging him gently. My thumb slips into Kasen’s ass, and I finger-fuck him as if it’s my cock, faster and faster.

  The moans that are stifled by the pillow make the tip of my shaft leak with arousal. I need him so badly, but I don’t want to hurt him. Even though I know I will. With my free hand, I grip my cock and tease the tip along his tight entrance and watch in awe as I slide into Kasen’s body for the second time tonight.

  “Fuck.”

  “Yes, fuck, that’s what I’m doing.” I grin almost playfully, but there’s nothing teasing about the way my hips drive forward, and I sink balls-deep into him. We both still for a moment, and I pick up the gun, holding it ready.

  Can I do it while I’m fucking him?

  Would he pulse around me, milking me, while he takes his last breath?

  Pulling out, I slam back in. My gaze locked on Kasen’s hands as he fists the sheets, holding onto the material as I take him. I own him in this moment. The heat of him searing me. The tightness of his body holding me hostage the same way I’m doing with him right in this moment.

  I stop all movement. It’s sudden, and his gaze lands on mine over his shoulder. Before he can say anything, I ask, “If I killed you now, would you still love me?”

  A small smile tilts Kase’s lips into one of those grins that I used to bask in when we were younger.

  “Fuck me, then kill me. Let me have the last pleasure before you do it.” His voice is ragged, his throat working hard to swallow the pain in knowing that I could easily kill him. “But I want you to remember, it doesn’t matter what you do, Max, I’ll love you in this life and the next.”