Retribution

by Evelyn Drake

  Steve ran to the pier’s end and stopped. He stopped and searched the water’s tortured surface. He could hear nothing .

  Dropping into a sudden plank position, Steve leaned over the piers end to look beneath the pier. No Michael .

  His eyes searched the lake again and his lungs refused to suck in air as if in sympathetic companionship to Michael’s inability to breathe, wherever he was .

  “Michael!” Steve screamed into the wind, but his voice was whipped away before the storm mocked his measly excuse of a yell by booming its own ripping cry .

  “Michael!” Steve screamed again, his eyes searching the lake’s surface, panicked desperation taking over his heart and his breathing. His muscles twitched, demanding that he do something—that he save him from the greatest loss he would ever know .

  Something pulled Steve’s eye to a spot thirty feet away and to his left. All Steve saw was the water’s choppy surface, but he kept his eyes fixed to that spot. Determined. Willing there to be more. When the quick bob of Michael’s head among the waves answered his unspoken wish, Steve leapt, diving into the frigid lake’s waters .

  The lake was much calmer below the surface and Steve stayed down for as long as he was able, swimming as hard as he could until his lungs burned and his body drove him to the lake’s surface of its own accord .

  Gasping for air, Steve searched his surroundings, turning his head in every direction. Panic had reached his gut as it sank in that he could lose Michael here, that Michael could slip away to make a future of his own creation—which would undoubtedly include his death .

  Steve almost screamed Michael’s name, but he held it in. Nothing but the raging storm and the splash of waves against his head could be heard, yet he was unwilling to cover what hopes he had with his own futile calls for a man who didn’t want to be found .

  Going under again, Steve swam. He went slower this time as his eyes searched the dark waters for any movement or shifts in light that might betray Michael’s location .

  There!

  Steve’s lungs were burning again as he changed course and swam for the flash of movement not natural to the lake. By the time he reached Michael’s kicking legs, the smaller man treading water with his head above the surface, Steve’s own body was desperate for air .

  Wrapping his arms around Michael’s torso, Steve yanked him down as he pushed himself up. Gasping for air when he reached the surface, his body was racked with coughs from the water’s spray he’d sucked in trying regain his breath. Under the water still within his grasp, Michael thrashed .

  Steve yanked Michael up to the surface before whirling the smaller man around so that they were back to chest. Michael fought him, flailing wildly as Steve held him in a lock around his throat with the crooked bend of his heavily muscled arm .

  “Stop!” Steve yelled above the storm. He tightened his arm in warning until Michael’s arms no longer flailed at the waters around him, but instead dug their fingers into Steve’s flesh in an effort to get air .

  “Just stop,” Steve said more gently this time into Michael’s ear as he let his arm’s grip slacken. Michael gasped air but then went still, the fight in him put on hold .

  “Give my body to the Family,” Michael croaked. “Promise me .”

  Steve’s free arm began a back stroke to take them back to the shore. “No .”

  “You owe me that !”

  “I owe you nothing!” Steve stopped his swimming stroke back to shore. “But you have everything,” he said, his mouth against Michael’s ear. Michael’s body softened against him, the fight or flight drive gone, and when Michael gently pulled away, Steve let him go .

  Turning in the water, Michael faced Steve. His expression was wary, and he said nothing, but the questions were in his eyes .

  “I love you,” Steve said .

  “You’re a killer... I didn’t know what that meant before. But you’re going to kill me. I get it now .”

  “I won’t... I can’t . Not you.” Steve shook his head and he reached a hand beneath the water for Michael’s arm and he pulled gently as he once more started his backward stroke toward shore .

  Michael swam forward into his arms and Steve’s heart cried when Michael’s lips took his. But then, as their kiss broke away, Michael pushed down with steady and growing insistency. A heartbeat later, Steve’s head was swallowed by the lake .

  He didn’t fight it. I’ll let it happen. This is okay. I’d rather die with him than alone and bleeding out. I’ll die with him. He relaxed his arms and let them float at his sides. He wasn’t able to force himself to breathe the water in, but he wished he could .

  Better this way .

  Steve’s lungs began to burn and when his arms started to thrash, he pulled them in tight to his body in a forced embrace to keep them from fighting for his life. Yet, his head tossed as bubbles of air escaped him. He crossed his feet at the ankles but they broke their stance twice, kicking, but each time he made them cross again .

  Breathe in! Do it! He feared not being able to give Michael back his own future. Steve knew that if he lived, he would not be able to control himself from trying to shape Michael’s future for him .

  His fists spasmed and contorted and his body began to thrash uncontrollably, but then he was being pulled toward the surface, toward air. He gasped it in as soon as his mouth broke water .

  Michael’s hands gripped Steve’s bare neck and shoulders and shook him. “Why would you let me? Why !”

  “I need you more than I need me,” Steve sputtered, still gasping for air .

  Michael’s pinched expression of anger melted and he yanked Steve to him, taking his mouth in a hungry, demanding and punishing kiss. Yanking away, he said, “I have to save Sara. No getting in my way, no stopping me. I have to save her .”

  “I know,” Steve said, nodding his head. “Whatever it takes. I’m yours. Just please, don’t leave me .”

  Michael stroked a hand over Steve’s hair before pulling the man close. The lake’s surface beat against them but they held each other, lost to the world as one. “You have me for now,” Michael whispered. “Now is all I can promise. Now is all I have .”

  14

  Michael

  M ichael pressed his palm hard to his side as he walked back through the ornate glass doors back into the house. He averted his eyes from the slumped figure of the home’s owner .

  It no longer moved. It had no breath in it. It just lay there, and Michael was put in mind of the thousand of horror movies that had the recently dead standing up to continue living without the spark of life. That something so recently alive could now be dead was hard to comprehend. The difference a few seconds could make was too much .

  “Come on,” Steve said, giving a gentle tug to Michael’s hand. With Steve in the lead, Michael followed him up a spiral of stairs, its curves a stark contrast to the home’s straight lines .

  Two door checks later had them inside a bedroom with an attached bathroom, and Michael once again found himself prepared by Steve for a hot shower. He stood before the bigger man and allowed his hands to pull his clothes from his body .

  Michael was tired. Bone tired. But he still managed to push it aside. The previous night’s hypothermia had left his joints achy and stiff, and he felt like a man of fifty instead of a man in his twenties .

  “What do you want with me?” Michael asked as Steve pulled the too-large t-shirt over his head .

  Leaning in, Steve stole a kiss as his hands went to work on Michael’s pants. Bypassing the waistband, he lowered the zipper and slipped his hand inside as he deepened their kiss .

  Michael moaned as Steve’s fingers wrapped around his shaft and began a simple stroke that had him growing hard and wanting .

  “Answer me,” he breathed into Steve’s hair as the man bit and nipped at Michael’s throat .

  Steve dropped to his knees in front of Michael, and his fingers went to work on getting his pants off. But looking up from his work, his brown eyes, that se
emed to hold somebody else’s soul—someone not a killer—stared unflinching into Michael’s .

  “I want you to love me as much as I love you .”

  Michael felt unmoved. He felt empty, and he saw Steve’s gaze wilt as the man turned his attention back to Michael’s pants .

  Michael lifted Steve’s face with a finger under his chin. “I don’t know you. You’re just the guy who keeps getting in the way of what I’ve got to do .”

  Steve flinched and pulled his face free to focus once more on Michael’s pants .

  You’re a heartless dick, Michael mocked himself .

  Sinking to his knees to be even with Steve, he took the bigger man’s face in his hands. “Why do you love me? What do you love about me ?”

  Steve looked as if he was the biggest nerd in school being asked to explain why he was cool to the star quarterback. He looked tortured and ready to be tossed away with a laugh .

  “Tell me,” Michael encouraged, his voice soft as he caressed Steve’s cheek with his thumb .

  Steve sat back on his heels, seeming to collect his thoughts before he spoke .

  “I’ve been lost for a while now. Had been lost. And then I got assigned to you. Nothing seemed to bother you. You could do anything. You could defy death and then later have ball slapping sex and sleep like a baby. Me... I go to sleep and wake up drenched in sweat wishing I could crawl out of my own skin .”

  Steve shrugged. “Then something happened. The longer I watched you, the better I felt. That’s when I started seeing you, actually seeing you . As a person instead of a target. I started noticing your quiet moments, and they got louder to me than all the rest. I started noticing your kindness. I loved how you made me feel about myself. I like myself better with you in my life.” He shifted uneasily as if he was nervous about what he needed to say next .

  “I thought I was straight all my life. If I had any other fantasies, I didn’t notice them. Maybe you’re right, maybe I’m bi, but I’ve only ever been with women. But, for you, I’ll be anyone or anything. You inside of me was the best I’ve ever had—it was different, but it was the best .”

  Michael watched closely. Judging by his memory of that night, it was true .

  “I don’t want to go back to who I was before you. I don’t like being that person anymore. And I will do as much as you’ll let me do to try to keep you .”

  Michael bit the inside of his lip. I’ve always been the throwaway guy. The fun guy. Never the everything guy. He couldn’t count the number of men he’d been with—men who found him pretty or fun or exciting. But none of them had loved him. Even his family had thrown him away. His father had suspected him of being gay before he even know what gay was, and the harshness his father had piled on him to toughen the gay out of him only left his heart scarred. It didn’t change who he wanted to lie next to at night .

  He loves me, Michael thought, studying Steve’s face, looking for any hint that he was being manipulative. But all he saw was guileless affection .

  Michael’s eyes stung as unshed tears gathered .

  “Hey, hey!” Steve said, showing instant concern .

  “I’m not the guy who gets loved,” Michael said, shaking his head no. “I’m the one who gets used…. How are you using me? Just tell me. Please. You’ve got the stone. Just take it and go. Kill me if you’re going to but don’t play with me .”

  Steve’s arms were around him in the next instant as kisses rained down on his face and lips. “I don’t want that fucking stone,” Steve growled. “You’re what’s precious to me. You, just you !”

  Michael found himself on the floor with Steve’s hard body on top of him, and he found himself clinging to Steve’s back as hope he’d long let go of surged to life anew within him .

  He loves me .

  Michael took Steve in a kiss that left his lips feeling bruised, yet it was somehow not enough .

  Their hands ripped at each other’s clothes until soon there was nothing between them. They fell over each other, locked in a lover’s embrace as they went from room to room, searching through drawers until they found what they needed .

  With a condom on and Steve on all fours, his knees perched at the very edge of the bed, thighs spread wide to lower his hips, Micheal did very little to prep his tight hole before pressing his cock’s round head to it and asking to be taken in .

  Steve moaned with the strain, but his hips never pulled forward. Instead, he leaned into Michael’s insistent push .

  “Push out,” Michael instructed. “Push as if you’re trying to push me out of you .”

  Steve did as Michael instructed, easing the entrance to what he offered Michael, and Michael took his chance. He pushing his head inside. The squeeze of Steve’s body was intense, and he held his position with just his head inside of Steve for the sake of his own needs as much as for Steve’s .

  In front of him, Steve moaned as he rocked backward and forward. Michael moved with him, staying firmly in place, and the sight of Steve struggling to take him only spurred his desires to new heights. That Steve was so willing to give of himself for Michael’s pleasure was like an aphrodisiac to Michael .

  Michael’s hand rubbed small circles on the small of Steve’s back but his other hand moved around to Steve’s front and claimed its hold on Steve’s cock. There, he stroked him to hard life. But he didn’t stop there, with his head in Steve’s ass, he continued to stroke Steve’s cock until the big man’s fingers were digging into the bed and his ass was spasming on Michael’s cock .

  Michael kept his stroke steady, short and fast as he felt Steve’s cock thicken in his hand .

  “Michael,” Steve breathed. “Stop. Oh god... I can’t... I’m going to ...”

  Michael continued to stroke, his hand soon covered and slick with Steve’s precum. Steve lowered his stance all the more and thrust his hips forward rhythmically as if fucking the air as his hole did its best to milk Michael’s head .

  “I’m going to! Ohhhh!” Steve groaned as his whole body tightened before several spasmodic thrusts had his hips tucking as his cum painted the top of the bed .

  Michael felt Steve’s body relax beneath him. With a hand on Steve’s shoulder and the other at his hip, he sank himself in one long inch after another until he was buried inside of Steve all the way to his hilt. Below him, Steve groaned loudly with the effort of taking Michael’s girth and length, but his hand reached back to hold to Michael’s thigh as if holding the man tighter against him .

  Michael loved the way men looked and sounded when he was inside them, and how they let him make them feel incredible. It was as if the pleasure was too intense to be contained just by laying there, and Michael was addicted to seeing a man enjoy taking him .

  With his hips pressed to the round of Steve’s ass, Michael pulsed his hips as he began a rhythmic, short stroke .

  He’d never seen a man who was topping enjoy sex as much as a man who was bottoming. He was jealous, in a way. But watching a man be pleasured on his cock was far too fun to ever take his turn on his knees .

  He sank himself in with a little greater force and smiled at Steve’s unfiltered moan. The fucking began in earnest then as he anchored his hand at the back of Steve’s neck and began a slow, pounding fuck of Steve’s ass that grew in speed until his hips and balls slapped at Steve with the force of every thrust .

  Climbing atop the bed with his feet to either side of Steve’s knees, Michael pushed down on Steve’s shoulders and continued his slapping, pounding fuck of Steve’s ass as the massively muscular man below him came undone with moaned growls and cries as Steve used him with a pleasure that was both intense and comforting .

  Burying his fingers in Steve’s hair, Michael pulled his head back, forcing Steve to arch his back as he further tilted his hips .

  “Yes!” Steve cried out .

  “Your ass better come,” Michael growled .

  “Yesss,” Steve whimpered on a breathy moan .

  “Do you love me ?”

&nb
sp; “Yes!”

  Michael’s pace quickened all the more to punish Steve’s ass. “You don’t,” he declared through gritted teeth .

  “I do !”

  “I’m just an easy fuck for you .”

  “Nooo, ohhh no. Oh god... Michael,” Steve panted .

  “You’re going to just move on to someone else,” Michael berated, releasing all his fears .

  “Never,” Steve growled back. “Only you. There’ll only ever be you. Oh god, fuck, Michael,” he moaned beneath Michael’s pistoning, slapping hips. “Oh god !”

  “You going to come for me ?”

  “Yessss! Oh god! Oh god !”

  Michael could feel Steve’s hole tightening and releasing on his cock, but it was when the spasms slowed and Steve’s hole felt looser that he knew that Steve’s orgasm was near .

  “Let it happen, baby. Let it go,” he encouraged as he held his brutal pace. Sweat beaded his forehead. His cock’s girth had grown, and his balls ached with the need to empty themselves. “Come for me, baby .”

  Every muscle of Steve’s body went stiff as the man stopped breathing .

  “That’s it,” Michael whispered. “Good boy.” He gritted his teeth as he held off his own need for release .

  A moment later a long, keening moan found its way up out of Steve’s depths as his body rocked forward and his hole spasmed hard on Michael’s shaft .

  A garbled cry escaped Michael as his need for release overcame him, and he pumped his load inside of Steve as Steve held steady for him, freezing his stance in place to give Michael the chance use him for his needs .

  All of Michael’s strength drained from him as his last surge released within Steve’s ass, and he folded himself over Steve’s back. As Steve moved, Michael slipped free of his place within him. But what he was given in place of Steve’s inner warmth were Steve’s arms around him. Holding him .

  “I do love you,” Steve whispered into Michael’s neck as his fingers trailed a bath down the valley of his back. “I love you.” Steve’s mouth found Michael’s, and he rolled Michael onto his back .