by Thom Collins
Car headlights swept across the room. He moved toward the window. If this was the taxi, it was early.
A man walked up the drive.
Matt’s heart sank when he saw who it was.
Jamie.
Of all the times.
Matt met him at the front door.
“Hey.” Jamie beamed. He looked much fresher than he had at the police station that afternoon. He wore jeans, an open-necked shirt and jacket. He’d had a shave too. Matt smelled his aftershave before he reached the door. Subtle, it wasn’t.
“Hi,” Matt said carefully. Some sixth sense warned him Jamie was after something. “Is something wrong?”
“No. I just wanted to talk to you. Mind if I come in?”
“It’s not a good time, Jamie. I’m on my way out.”
“Oh.” His smile faltered. “I thought we could talk, that’s all. Can I come back later?”
“Not really. I don’t know what time I’ll be home. It could be late.”
Jamie suddenly looked nervous. Matt had an awful hunch he knew what this was about. Something they had resolved months ago. He knew something had been going through Jamie’s mind this afternoon. He should have predicted this.
“Seeing you again this week has made me realize that it’s not really over between us.”
“You’re wrong, Jamie. It is over.”
“How can you say that? We were so good together. Not perfect. I know that. Nothing ever is. But we were a good match, weren’t we? I can be moody and difficult, but I was better when I was with you. You made me better.” His dark eyes implored. “Please, Matt. Don’t leave it like this. Give me another chance. C’mon, please.”
How could they be playing this bloody scene again?
“Jamie, I’ve given you other chances. Lots of them. We didn’t break up without trying. We tried damn hard to make things work between us. But they didn’t. Don’t bring it all up again. You need to move on.”
“I can’t.” His voice was barely a whisper.
“I have,” Matt said softly, hating himself for the pain his words caused. The anguish was clear on Jamie’s face. “Sorry, but it’s true. I’m not saying this to hurt you, but I’ve moved on. You must too.”
“I don’t believe you. I felt it this afternoon. There’s still something there.”
“There isn’t.” God, how many times had he said this already? Their relationship hadn’t come to an abrupt end. It had died a slow death. Jamie had always looked back with a rose-tinted perspective. Even their good times hadn’t been that great. “Look, I’m going on a date tonight. I wouldn’t have been so cruel as to tell you that but you leave me no choice.”
He stared at Matt with wide, wounded eyes. Betrayed eyes. “With who?”
“No one you know. Someone I’ve only just met.”
“Are you fucking him?”
“No. We’ve just met,” he snapped, and was immediately angry at having to defend his behavior. “It’s none of your business who I fuck. One man or fifty, I’ll sleep with whomever I want. You know why? Because I’m single and I can.”
Jamie’s face twisted. Matt thought he was going to cry. It was an expression he’d come to know well. Jamie opened his mouth wide and sucked in deep breaths, fighting the urge to let the tears spill. His eyes glistened.
“Fine,” he choked. “Do… Do what you want.”
He turned and hurried to his car. On other nights, Matt would have gone after him. Maybe tonight, under different circumstances, he’d have followed him again, but he stayed where he was. The emotional cord had been severed. Jamie might be stuck in the past but Matt meant what he had said. He was moving on.
Jamie’s unwelcome appearance couldn’t spoil the night. Not a chance. Jamie would say he was being heartless but there was nothing he could do. That chapter of his life was over.
It was time to start a new one.
****
Matt was meeting Dale in town, at the bar of the River House Hotel. He’d only been there once before for a private function, but whoever had recommended this place to Dale had chosen well. It was a traditional hotel in keeping with the ancient city. Decorated in a modern, yet classic style. It was quiet and understated. They wouldn’t have to worry about the public outrage surrounding Dale’s TV show in a place like this.
He headed straight to the bar. As predicted it was small and quiet. A couple of businessmen sat at a table in one corner. A woman in a smart suit was having a glass of wine alone.
“Over here.” A familiar American accent caused his heart to skip.
Dale rose from a sofa in another corner of the room. Something inside Matt went crazy at the sight of him.
Take it easy. Be cool.
Dale looked amazing in dark blue jeans, which clung perfectly to his solid thighs. He wore a red checked shirt with the top two buttons undone, offering a tantalizing glimpse of his chest. Just a hint of body hair showing. He smelled good too. A fresh, expensive smelling scent that was perfectly suited to him. It struck him, not for the first time, just how good-looking Dale was.
My God, he’s simply beautiful.
“Come on, take a seat.”
Matt’s butt had barely touched the sofa when a waitress appeared with a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket.
“Hope you’re not hungry yet,” Dale said, smiling wide, showing great white teeth. “I thought we could have a drink before going through to the restaurant.”
“No, I’m good.” The truth was he had no appetite for anything but Dale. He had never been smitten so quickly by anyone. His eyes roamed, trying to take in all of him. Those dazzlingly blue eyes. That smile. His hands. His chest. His hair. How did I get so lucky?
“Are you okay?” Dale asked, still smiling.
Matt pulled himself together. He was acting like a randy teenager. “Absolutely.” They raised their glasses. “Cheers.”
The champagne was cold and dry. Delicious.
“How are you anyway? Tough couple of days, eh?” He’d caught the local news in the car on the way home. The controversy about Blood Falls on Stone had not abated. It was getting worse.
“Hanging in there. This has all come out of the blue. The saddest thing is that the press is more interested in what we’re doing than they are in the actual victims. Real people are dead. We’re just pretending. It’s messed up.”
“I think it’s the combination of the two that makes it so newsworthy. A local tragedy together with the glamor and excitement of a TV show. It must be like Christmas to these reporters.”
“I just wish they’d move their attentions to what matters, rather than what we’re doing. Know what I’m saying?”
“I do. But murder, that’s not a very common event in a small city. Especially crimes of this kind. Most of the murders I’ve encountered in my career have been domestic in nature. Big budget TV dramas—well, they’re even rarer in a place like this.”
“Let’s not talk about it,” Dale said, fixing him with his beautiful eyes. “I came to get away from all that. Tonight I want to find out all about you.”
His nerves evaporated quickly. Dale was such an easy man to be around. As they took their time drinking the champagne, Matt told him about his life and his work. He opened up in a way he wouldn’t have thought possible with a man he’d only just met.
“So you are single?” Dale asked with a twinkle in his eyes. “I don’t want to go stepping on anyone’s toes.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’m very single. I have been for about three months.” That was as much as he wanted to say about Jamie. There was a story he didn’t feel like sharing, especially after tonight’s little drama.
After an hour they went into the restaurant. Like the bar, it was intimate. There were only ten tables and tonight just six other diners. It was decorated with a library theme. Rows of leather-bound volu
mes covered one wall, while portraits of famous authors adorned the others.
A soft-spoken waiter seated them and presented the wine list.
“More wine?” Matt joked. “On a school night?”
“Ah, let’s live a little. I don’t know about you but I fully intend to take a rain check on old Clint’s boot camp tomorrow morning.”
“I don’t think there’s any chance of me making it.”
“Good.” Dale looked at the menu. “Any preference?”
“Red,” Matt answered. “After the champagne, I feel like something deep and rich.”
Dale ordered a bottle of Amarone.
Two bottles of wine on a weeknight. There was no way Matt would rise for boot camp after that. He’d have to be careful driving to work in the morning too. Maybe he should call Annabel and get her to pick him up. She owed him a favor after today’s police station stunt.
They took their time over the menu. Matt wasn’t in the mood for anything heavy. He chose pan-fried scallops with chorizo and black pudding to start and sea bass with potato croquets and crushed peas for his main course.
“What’s black pudding?” Dale asked.
“It’s kind of a sausage made from pig’s blood and oatmeal. It sounds disgusting when described like that but trust me, it’s absolutely delicious.”
“Okay,” Dale said warily. “I’ll take your word for that but all the same, I’ll pass.” He ordered the same starter minus the black pudding and a medium steak for his main course. “It’s not adventurous, I know, but if steak is an option I can never resist. I hear they’re great here too. From a butcher’s right across the street.”
It was a fantastic meal in wonderful company. As the plates came and went, they gently quizzed each other, opening up about their pasts. Matt had never met a real celebrity before, but there was no ego to Dale. He was as normal and down to earth as any guy he knew.
He talked about growing up in Pennsylvania and the importance of family and his son.
“How long were you married?” Matt asked.
“Eight years.” Dale took a sip of wine before saying, “I don’t regret it. Not a bit. But I do regret staying married to Laura for so long. I held her back. If we’d got divorced sooner she could have got on with her life. Ours was a marriage in name only most of the time. We have a great relationship now and if we hadn’t been together I wouldn’t have such a fantastic son.”
Matt nodded thoughtfully. “I never had that doubt. You know, about sex. I only ever liked other boys. The notion of getting together with a girl… It was never a possibility.”
Dale shrugged. “I always knew I liked guys but it took me a long time to accept it. I was in my late twenties before I realized this wasn’t just a phase. That I wasn’t going to grow out of it.”
“Being in the public eye can’t have helped.”
“No. Not when your career amounts to playing the boyfriend of the hot chick. Those roles didn’t amount to much but they were all I had. If word got out that I liked dick, those one-dimensional parts would be passed to the next pretty boy. In order to keep working, I had to keep quiet about all that.”
“Isn’t it different now? There are so many openly gay actors. They all get work.”
Dale rolled his eyes. “And what work do they get? The gay kids in Glee. The gay men in HBO comedies and dramas. I’m not putting that down, it’s just not for me. Besides, it’s not only my career I have to think about. I don’t want my son to grow up being bullied as the kid with the fag dad on TV. Maybe when he’s older it won’t be such a big deal. But I can’t do that to him. Not yet.”
The waiter returned to ask if they wanted dessert. They were both too full but ordered liqueur coffees to finish the meal. Matt couldn’t stop looking at Dale the whole time. The color of his eyes looked deeper than the Atlantic in the soft light of the restaurant. Dale looked right back at him, a sexy smile on his lips.
“So… What now?”
Matt’s spine prickled. “Well… What do you suggest?”
“We’re taking it as a given that we’re blowing off boot camp in the morning?”
“Absolutely.”
Dale leaned in closer. Matt mirrored him.
“Then I want to fuck you,” Dale said slowly, eyes sparkling. “I’ve wanted it since you walked in. To tell the truth, I’ve wanted it since I set eyes on you on Monday. Your face, your body, your ass—you’ve been driving me crazy.”
Matt’s cock, which had been idling in a state of semi-stiffness, was suddenly very hard.
“I don’t care how we do it,” Dale continued. “Top. Bottom. I go either way. All I care about is getting close to you. Getting my hands on that body of yours before it drives me insane.”
Beneath the table, Matt rubbed his calf up against Dale’s. “Let’s get out of here.”
****
They managed to contain themselves in the taxi but it was hard. So very hard. Matt wanted him with every fiber of his body. The temptation to grab his crotch as soon as they slid onto the back seat was immense. To take hold of his head and mash their lips together. But he controlled himself, keeping his hands on his knees and staring at the back of the taxi driver’s head as they traveled back to town.
There was more than enough controversy surrounding the Blood Falls on Stone production without the lead actor making headlines for getting it on with another man in the back of a taxi.
They made the decision to go to Matt’s place. It was nearer.
Nothing could hold them back once they were through the front door,. They were all over each other in the hall, their mouths locked in passion. Matt’s hands tore at Dale’s body. He quickly explored the muscle of Dale’s back through his clothes, slipping lower to settle on the hard curve of his butt. Wow—that ass is stacked. He gripped it in both hands and pulled Dale’s hips tight against his own, feeling the hard urgency of his cock.
Dale’s hands were just as persistent, going farther. He slipped down the back of Matt’s jeans and planted his hand against bare skin.
“Oh man,” Dale sighed between open-mouthed kisses. “What an ass. Where’s the bedroom?”
They left a trail of clothes in their wake, from the door and all the way up the stairs. By the time they reached the bedroom, they were down to their underpants. In hurried snatches, Matt tried to take in the detail of Dale’s body. His hairy chest and belly. The fine lines of his pecs and shoulder muscles. He was toned—no surplus flesh on his hunky frame. All the things that turned him on in a man. But there was no time to take it all in. Their passion and hunger was too intense for that.
“Matt, Matt, you’ve got me on fire.”
Matt tore down Dale’s underpants, releasing his thick, circumcised cock. He wrapped his fist around it, feeling the satisfying weight and girth. Dale groaned as he squeezed and tugged the shaft. He cupped his balls, nicely shaved, between his hairy thighs.
Clearly not wanting to miss out, Dale shoved down Matt’s pants and grabbed his dick. He took delight in his foreskin, tugging the folds back and forth across the head.
They fell onto the bed naked and arranged themselves into a sixty-nine position, taking each other’s cock in their mouth. Matt slowed, only briefly, to explore Dale’s dick with his lips, kissing the head, teasing the sensitive triangle of skin beneath the tiny opening with his tongue, eliciting a drop of pre-cum to the tip. He licked and tasted before taking the shaft, as much as he could manage, into his mouth. It wasn’t easy. Dale was big. But the hot wetness of Dale’s mouth around his own cock was potent encouragement. Soon he was taking him so deep that his nose pressed against his silky smooth ball sac.
His slid his hand behind to take hold of Dale’s meaty ass, slipping his fingers into the hot crack. He explored the hairy crevice and located the small, fiery opening. Dale tried to groan as he tested the ring with just the tip of his finger but his
mouth was full. Soon Dale was exploring him the same way, slipping his fingers into Matt’s lightly furred butt crack and teasing the opening.
“Oh man,” Dale gasped, releasing his cock. “I want you to fuck my ass. You gotta do it.” He jerked his hips, pushing his ass against Matt’s fingers.
“You want it?” He teased, sliding his finger inside.
“Oh God. Yes. Yes! Fuck me!”
“Only if you fuck me too,” Matt insisted. He wanted to experience Dale in every possible way.
“Oh, I’ll fuck you all right. Fuck you real good. But you first. My ass needs it more.”
Matt hurriedly reached for a bottle of lube and a condom from his bedside cabinet. Dale rolled onto his back and raised his legs, presenting his beautiful ass. Matt put on the rubber and lubed his fingers. He spread the slick lube all around Dale’s opening before slipping his fingers inside to ease the passage.
“That okay?”
Dale hooked his arms around his knees and hitched his butt higher. He looked directly at Matt, dark and intense. “Just fuck me, Matt. Fuck me. I want your dick.”
Matt spread more lube over his condom-covered cock and climbed onto the bed, kneeling between Dale’s thighs. He leaned in, guiding his cock to the opening, and felt the resistance give. Dale opened to him. Matt pushed a little more until the head of his cock entered Dale’s tight ass, then slowly and smoothly sliding to the hilt.
“Oh yeah.” Dale smiled a mile wide, then raised his head from the bed, his mouth seeking Matt’s.
It was heaven. On top and inside the most ruggedly handsome man. All of Matt’s senses were alert to him. Taste, smell, touch, even the sound of their bodies in motion. Bare skin sliding against skin. But his ass—oh God his ass—so smooth and hot, holding him so tight. Matt stayed still, allowing Dale time to get used to the fullness inside.
Dale’s hunger was insatiable. He wrapped his legs around Matt’s waist. “Don’t hold back. I can take it.”
They fucked long and hard, all over the bed, in every position. Matt pulled out to take him from behind, then Dale was on top, like a cowboy. Side by side, Matt gave it to him in a spooning position. They eventually came back to the first position and it was Matt’s favorite, on top of Dale, kissing him, looking into his eyes.
