by Beth Bolden
“It’s lovely,” he murmurs, craning his neck up so he can whisper it directly into Quentin’s ear. “I love it.”
I love you.
He doesn’t say it even though he can feel the weight of the words on his tongue. Perhaps they’re not begging to be confessed right now, but they’re present and Landon couldn’t ever forget them. At some point, he fully expects that he won’t be able to contain them any longer, and they’ll come tumbling out, end over end, probably a bit lumpy and awkward, but real and true all the same.
Hopefully whenever that particular moment comes, Quentin will be in love with Landon too, and he won’t care that Landon’s words aren’t perfect. He’ll only care that they exist at all.
The way Quentin holds him back, just as close, just as tight, his arms still careful to be gentle, cradling Landon’s back as if he is precious—that alone is enough to relax Landon into the embrace. Enough so that he can tilt his head back and kiss Quentin with everything he doesn’t quite have the courage to say yet.
“I’m sorry we didn’t win today,” Quentin says quietly.
Landon is sorry too, but he’s sure as hell not going to let Quentin see that. It’s not Quentin’s fault. Their lack of first places is down to the whims of the judges, not any fault of Quentin’s.
“Don’t be,” Landon murmurs, brushing his hair back and lifting onto his tiptoes so he can leave a trail of tiny kisses along Quentin’s exposed collarbone. “You’re wonderful.”
Landon is just beginning to deepen one to the vibrant scarlet of a love bite when Quentin pulls away unexpectedly. “Tonight is supposed to be about you,” Quentin says with a tiny wrinkle forming between his brows.
“What if I want to leave you this love bite?”
Quentin wavers for a moment, and Landon pounces, hoping to push him over the edge. “Personally, I think it should always be about both of us, don’t you think?”
He barely waits for Quentin’s acquiescing nod before pouncing, reaching up to kiss him.
Quentin only takes a moment to catch up, and he’s kissing back with so much passion that Landon feels his heart lighten. Surely someone who can kiss him this way must have similar feelings?
Before Landon can go on a long-winded analysis in his mind about Quentin’s feelings, the bed hits the back of his knees gently, and he realizes that Quentin’s been moving them backwards towards the big fluffy white bed in the center of the room.
The bed is an idea he can get behind.
Landon finally lets the worry go and just revels in the feel of Quentin’s lips on his, his tongue snaking in to touch his, the way his hands reverently coast over Landon’s curves, sliding his t-shirt over his head.
Landon scoots up on the bed and Quentin looms over him, his eyes a deep, serious blue. “You’re so gorgeous,” Quentin says softly, as he buries his face in Landon’s neck.
Gasping a bit at the love bite Quentin is leaving him, lips relentless against the sensitive curve of his neck, Landon gasps as Quentin adds teeth, nibbling with just enough pressure to make his stomach swoop.
By the time Quentin reaches the curve of his jaw, he’s more than gasping, he’s now panting a little, cock thickening up in his jeans. “Feels good, doesn’t it?”
There’s absolutely nothing hotter than this—touching and being touched by the person you love. Landon has never liked one-night stands; doesn’t like the impersonality of the touches. He enjoys his serial monogamy all the way up until the relationships sour, but even then, nothing has ever felt like this before. It’s like Quentin’s inside his head, touching him from the inside out, knowing what he likes as if he’s experiencing the sensations as Landon does. It’s heady and Landon has to force himself to shove away the sudden pang of fear that this too might end someday.
It’s really not easy, but Landon does it by turning his focus back on the beautiful man hovering over him. Landon reaches down and pulls up Quentin’s t-shirt by the hem, lifting it over his head, and slides his palms everywhere he can, reveling in the way the muscles bunch underneath the smooth skin. His fingers drift lower, toying a bit with the button of his jeans, tucking into the sensitive skin alongside his waist.
While Landon has been teasing, Quentin’s moved lower, mouthing insistently at Landon’s collarbones. He’s gentle yet demanding. Landon can feel the insistent desire under every touch, but that Quentin doesn’t give in makes the tenderness Landon receives literally awe-inspiring.
Quentin moves lower, tongue reaching out to caress one nipple, and the heat of Quentin’s mouth its own kind of insistence. Landon thinks he might be murmuring a litany of half-formed words into his skin and it’s not until he quiets and listens hard that he can finally make out what Quentin’s mumbling between kisses and nips and love bites. “God, lovely, so beautiful, stunning.”
Everywhere Quentin’s mouth touches, it feels like his words are being absorbed into Landon’s body. Landon feels light and free and loved. He knows he’s felt this way about someone before—almost certainly feels this much or more—but he’s never had someone feel this way about him.
Quentin reaches the tiny pouch of a tummy that Landon has always hated. He still hates it, but maybe not quite as fervently as Quentin nibbles at the skin there, caressing it like it’s the sexiest six-pack in the entire universe.
Landon is nearly incoherent with love and a hot, insistent lust by the time Quentin’s breath stutters over his straining erection.
“God, Quen, please,” he begs and Quentin doesn’t even tease. He just strips his jeans and pants off and his mouth skates up one thigh, nibbling a bit on the flex of muscle as Landon strains to get his hard cock somewhere near Quentin’s miracle of a mouth.
“Gorgeous,” Quentin pants just before he slides his lips down Landon’s length. Landon barely registers it, he’s lost in a wave of sensation as Quentin swirls his tongue insistently around the head.
Quentin’s hand clamps around Landon’s thigh and he gives him so much hot, wet suction that Landon feels like he must be sucking his brain out his dick. Far too soon, he trembles at the heat building in his belly. “Quentin,” he begs, “gonna come.”
He pulls off instantly. Too instantly for Landon’s liking; he pouts a little as Quentin sheds the rest of his clothes, his own cock so hard, the wet head bounces against those glorious abs as he reaches over to grab lube and a condom from the drawer.
“Want you to come on my cock,” Quentin murmurs as he slicks up his fingers and helps prop Landon’s hips up. “Gonna make you feel so good, baby.”
“Already feels good.” Landon knows he sounds a bit delirious, but with that mouth all over his body, how was he supposed to sound any different? And it’s probably a good thing he got that out first, because Quentin’s beautiful fingers—fingers he’s been worshipping in his dreams since the day they met—are circling his hole and he’s speechless with how much he just wants.
Quentin slides a finger in, big and thick, though nowhere near as thick as the cock he’s trying to prep Landon to take. “More,” Landon manages to insist when Quentin moves too slow, too careful for his liking. He likes it fast and hard, though the romance of this encounter is probably not the right place for dirty fucking.
“Gonna give you everything you need,” Quentin reassures him, and slides a second finger in, the stretch around his rim a bit painfully insistent but still so good already. “Anything you ever want.”
“Good,” Landon can only pant weakly as Quentin slides in and out, still tender, but determined enough to find his prostate on the fourth try.
Quentin’s fingers teasingly circle the little nub, and Landon buries his face in his bicep, mouthing at the skin, trying to distract himself enough that he doesn’t scream or come.
A third finger teases around his rim, and Landon can’t contain his moan of acceptance and pleasure. “Make you feel so good,” Quentin says, his voice rough and gravelly. He sounds like he’s enjoying giving Landon this about as much as he’s enjoying taking it.
And that’s probably the hottest part of this: how much they enjoy each other.
Quentin stretches Landon out careful and slow, but with such determined brushes against his prostate that Landon is desperate within a few minutes. “Give it to me,” he slurs, not even caring how demanding he sounds. If Quentin doesn’t hurry up, Landon is going to come and ruin all those lovely daydreams about coming on that beautiful cock of his.
He gives Landon one more teasing circle against his prostate and then removes his fingers, making quick work of the condom.
Quentin leans in to kiss Landon’s slack mouth as he snags his cock against Landon’s rim. “Oh fuck, you’re gonna feel so good,” he pants into Landon’s mouth. “Hot and tight and gorgeous.”
“So pretty,” Landon agrees mindlessly as he reaches up to stroke Quentin’s curls away from his forehead.
The head of Quentin’s cock slowly entering him punches the rest of the breath out of Landon’s lungs. Quentin is so big and hard and it feels inescapable in the best way as Quentin slowly fucks him into the fluffy white duvet.
When he’s fully inside Landon, they both let out a moan, their voices harmonizing together in the still of the room. Landon has never felt so full in his god damn life, and he’s never loved anything more. Quentin’s cock is already brushing his prostate, a white-hot burning shooting through his veins as the pleasure already threatens to overwhelm him.
“Love me,” Landon whispers into Quentin’s lips.
Quentin gives a short, tortured nod and fucks him at a pace that might have tortured a previous version of Landon, but tonight, Landon just eats up his long, slow strokes. The pleasure is so hot and thick he can only mouth over the exposed curve of Quentin’s throat in wet slurps. Quentin doesn’t seem to mind because he’s moaning just about as loudly as Landon is now, deep and hard every time he bottoms out.
“Close,” Landon groans as Quentin’s hips begin to stutter, not quite as controlled as before. Landon thinks he’s about to come probably, from the pained expression on his face, to the way his fingers grip Landon’s hips even tighter than before, and Landon wants nothing more than to come with him.
Quentin seems pretty gone but he’s apparently not far gone enough to slide his hand across Landon’s hip bone and grasp his hard cock, stroking it insistently.
It’s all Landon needs to fall off the razor-sharp edge that Quentin’s been building inside Landon since they met at the bakery. He comes with a shout and his teeth grazing Quentin’s throat, vision growing blurry as come splatters up Quentin’s chest and he feels his hole clench once, then twice around Quentin’s dick.
Quentin follows with a deep groan of his own, his hips slamming home and grinding his cock there for a long, drawn-out moment as he comes into the condom.
Landon can’t even complain when Quentin finally collapses on top of him, come and sweat and lube smearing between them.
“Wonderful Quentin,” Landon murmurs into his damp skin.
“Wonderful Landon,” Quentin mumbles back a few long moments later. “Definitely, wonderful Landon.”
They sleep hard for two-ish hours, Landon finally waking up with his mouth full of Quentin’s curls and his skin tacky and gross with various dried patches.
The room is dark, the candles long since sputtered out in their own melted wax.
“Quentin,” Landon mumbles, pulling away but groaning when his skin literally sticks to Quentin’s. Immediately falling asleep in each other’s arms had seemed like such a great idea at the time, but now, it’s becoming clear it wasn’t.
“Ow,” Quentin moans back. He must have also discovered where they’re glued together.
“Shower,” Landon says as insistently as he can, considering he’s half-asleep and his front is literally stuck to Quentin’s back.
Quentin nods, and Landon slowly, agonizingly peels them apart. When he’s finally free, he collapses back onto the bed, panting a little at how much his skin stings.
Landon hears Quentin rustling on his side of the bed and begins to work up the energy to move again. But before he can, he feels Quentin’s arms slide under him and suddenly he’s airborne, Quentin lifting him bridal-style.
“Don’t you dare drop me!” Landon yelps as Quentin moves towards the bathroom.
Landon can feel Quentin’s chest shaking with laughter as he finally deposits him, bare-ass naked on the bathroom counter. Quentin leans over and flips the shower on, steam quickly filling the bathroom.
Quentin mumbles something under his breath as he slips into the shower. Landon slides off the counter and follows him in.
Quentin’s hair is wet and he pushes it back, eyes twinkling bright in the dim light of the bathroom. “You’re precious cargo,” he repeats with an impudent grin. Landon really can’t let this stand. He takes a step closer, spray misting over his face.
“Precious?” Landon asks, and he hates how high and anxious his voice sounds. Like he’s desperate for Quentin to confess his love. Which he is. Completely. Who is he kidding?
Quentin falling in love with Landon and telling Landon first would make everything about a million times simpler. But of course, all Quentin does is shake his hair like a shaggy dog, finishing what the light mist had started and getting Landon all wet.
“Scrub a dub dub,” Quentin sings, his smile giddy and light as he pours shampoo in his hands and scrubs first his head and then Landon’s. He’s got a nice deft touch with the perfect amount of pressure, big hands massaging Landon’s head as well as they’ve massaged all his other body parts.
“You’ve got a nice voice,” Landon points out after he’s rinsed his head. He’s soaping up his skin now, trying to not notice how gorgeous Quentin’s pale skin is when it’s wet like this, shining under the light.
“It’s okay.” Quentin brushes it aside the way he brushes aside most compliments, though typically they’re compliments about his cooking—or his truly ridiculous good looks. Landon spent an entirely non-creepy evening last week watching all the YouTube videos he could find that featured Quentin and couldn’t help but notice that he prefers to not take the credit.
Landon wants Quentin to have all the credit in the world, especially when they win Kitchen Wars and he can finally open the bakery of his dreams.
They finish rinsing off and dry off—they only get distracted by all the bare, naked skin once, when Landon pushes Quentin up against the tiny counter and kisses him soft and sweet, a nice contrast to the way his thumbs are digging hard into Quentin’s hips.
Landon finally lifts his mouth from Quentin’s when he hears his stomach grumble insistently. “Hungry?” Quentin asks with an impudent grin.
“Oh shut up.” Landon makes a face. “You’re the brilliant chef. Dinner, please?”
It turns out that even though Quentin is a brilliant chef, he has no intention of stretching his culinary muscles tonight.
“Pancakes?” Landon asks with disbelief as he watches Quentin dump in flour and sugar and salt in a bowl. He cracks several eggs terrifyingly quick against the side of a large glass pitcher and whisks the yolks separate from the whites.
He makes it so easy—dividing the eggs that way, and Landon can only stare at him agape from his perch on the counter.
“I thought you weren’t gonna go super chef on me.”
Quentin raises an eyebrow as he gently folds in his egg whites. “Don’t tell me you use a mix.”
“I only use a mix,” Landon admits, though he’s only made pancakes a handful of times, even from a mix. “My pancakes taste fine.”
Even though Quentin is already turned towards his cast iron pan, heating on the stove, Landon can still see his grimace. Sometimes Landon can’t really understand how good they are together. After all, they’ve only known each other a few weeks. Shouldn’t it be much harder to be so in sync? Instead it’s been as easy and straightforward as those eggs Quentin just separated.
“Okay, time to practice,” Quentin insists, beckoning him over.
“I’ll
just fuck it up,” Landon says apprehensively.
“You won’t,” Quentin promises. “And even if you do, you won’t. It’s just flour and eggs and a little bit of vanilla. I’ve got lots more.”
Landon slides off the counter, retrospectively glad that he’d put on a pair of Quentin’s sweatpants, and approaches the stove with trepidation.
“See those little bubbles?” Quentin asks, waving the spatula in Landon’s face until he forcibly grabs it. He absently nods, focusing far more on slapping Quentin’s butt with the plastic utensil instead of actually using it to flip pancakes.
“Landon!” Quentin sounds more amused than mad, but there’s daggers in his eyes. “Pay attention. This pancake is going to burn if you don’t flip it now. See how the bubbles in the middle have all burst? That means it’s done.”
“Sorry, your ass is just too distracting,” Landon says with a smirk. Quentin flushes, and it’s worth the first pancake being a tiny bit burnt after Landon finally flips it.
They slowly make their way through the batter Quentin’s whipped up, and as it disappears from the bowl, a pile of beautiful golden-brown pancakes appear on a plate on the other side of the stove.
“See?” Quentin impudently tells Landon as he pours maple syrup over his stack of pancakes. “That wasn’t so difficult.”
“It’s a good thing you were supervising.” Landon gestures with his fork. “Otherwise, we might have starved.”
“You mean, it’s a good thing I supervised, otherwise you’d have ended up on your knees and pancakes wouldn’t be what you’d be eating?”
Landon is shocked into silence for a good, long moment. How does Quentin know him so well?
“How do you know me so well?” he’s finally able to splutter out.
Quentin just shrugs and shovels more pancakes into his mouth. Landon can’t really blame him; they’re delicious. Way better than the boxed mix that he always used to buy for his sisters, but you won’t find him admitting that to Quentin. “You’re more famous than you give yourself credit for, Landon.”
