Strays and Lovers

by John Inman

  Gray’s eyes, as bright as steel, traveled over Eddie’s body as he began pulling his own clothes away, tossing them haphazardly about the room.

  Eddie’s cock had risen and stood fat and proud, pulsing with desire. Gray’s eyes settled on it, and the tip of his pink tongue came out to lick his lips.

  When he had freed himself of everything but his socks, which he stubbornly left on, Gray took a single step forward and dropped to his knees at Eddie’s feet. His fingers slid through the hair on Eddie’s thighs and he leaned in to press a kiss to the mat of pubic hair bristling at the base of Eddie’s erection.

  Eddie’s knees almost buckled when Gray’s mouth touched him there.

  Gray smiled an all-too-knowing smile as he peered up across the furry expanse of Eddie’s stomach and chest. One hand followed the path of his eyes, caressing Eddie’s warm torso upward until his arm was extended fully and his fingertips came to rest on Eddie’s lips. One finger gently worked its way into that moist, accepting cave, and Eddie claimed it for his own.

  “You’re so beautiful,” Gray said, his voice deep with need. His cock was hard now too. Eddie could feel it pressing against his shin, bobbing almost imperceptibly with the hammering of Gray’s excited heart.

  “So are you,” Eddie gasped as Gray’s lips continued to move through the hair at the base of his cock. When Gray gently cupped Eddie’s balls in his free hand and pressed his thumb lightly into the softness there, Eddie’s hips lurched forward of their own accord, pushing his iron shaft against Gray’s cheek, which was still cool and moist from the rain. Closing his eyes, Eddie tangled his fingers through Gray’s damp hair and pulled him even closer. When his cock caressed Gray’s face from chin to forehead, Gray tilted his head back and stretched upward to place a kiss on the tender skin just below the corona.

  From somewhere deep inside himself, Eddie heard a tiny whimper escape. Gray rose up higher on his knees and tucked the bulging head between his lips, sucking it in as deep as it would go. This time Eddie all but thrashed around like a fish out of water, what with the sensations pouring through him. He doubled over, gathering Gray desperately in his arms and burying his cock ever deeper into Gray’s hungry, worshipping mouth.

  Gray released Eddie’s cock then. Still moist from his attentions, he let it stand snugly against his cheek while he gazed up once again into Eddie’s eyes. There was a look of such inner peace on Gray’s face, Eddie’s heart gave a lurch. He cupped his hands on either side of Gray’s perfect face and leaned farther down to lay a kiss to his lovely damp mouth.

  Suddenly Eddie needed more. Much more. He slipped his hands under Gray’s arms and pulled him to his feet. Their two cocks, each as hard as the other, did a gentle pas de deux, bumping heads down below when the two men came together for another kiss.

  Eddie tasted Gray’s tongue, the hot rubbery texture of it against his own. Gray’s hand eased downward along Eddie’s spine and dipped a single finger into the cleft of warm flesh he found there, seeking out Eddie’s most private spot as if he had every right to explore it. When he rested a fingertip against the puckered opening, Eddie opened his legs and offered easier access, not hesitating for a moment.

  Trembling so much now that he could barely stand up, Eddie tugged Gray around and all but tossed him onto the bed. Cats and dogs who had been napping under the bed ran for their lives. The only one who didn’t seem disturbed by the sudden show of force was Gray. He lay on the bed flat on his back, looking down his body at Eddie standing naked at the foot of the bed. Gray’s hand slipped around his own cock, and he lazily stroked it while his gaze never once left Eddie’s face. Laughter and hunger battled for control in those pewter-colored eyes.

  With the lamp on the nightstand burning brightly, Eddie had a perfect view of everything Gray did. While one hand cupped his balls, Gray’s other hand moved along the length of his upright cock. He held it motionless, erect and beautiful, as if suggesting this might be the right time for Eddie to give it the attention it deserved.

  So Eddie did.

  Grinning like a fox who’s been invited into the chicken house, Eddie dropped onto the bed and burrowed down between Gray’s outstretched legs. Lean and strong and coated with blond hair, those long legs felt heavenly against his face. Eddie ducked his head and pressed a kiss to Gray’s velvet balls. Gray’s back arched, and when he had lifted himself as high off the bed as he could, Eddie climbed the crest of his trembling body and lowered his mouth over Gray’s standing cock.

  Gray’s groan of ecstasy was everything Eddie could hope for. While Gray’s fingers pulled and tugged at his hair, Eddie’s lips and tongue carried Gray to the brink of release. Man, that didn’t take long! Eddie forced himself to slow down, pulling back time and time again just as Gray was about to explode. After a few happy minutes of this, which Eddie thoroughly enjoyed, Gray was left writhing and panting on the bed.

  At long last, Eddie decided playtime was over. It was his hunger for Gray’s release that won the battle. He once more tucked Gray’s straining cock between his lips, and this time he did not pull away when Gray began to arch beneath him. He worshipped Gray’s cock until the head of it swelled, Gray’s long trembling legs came up to clamp themselves around him like a vise, and Gray’s juices spilled out on a cry of bliss that left Eddie ready to spill his own seed without even being touched.

  As if knowing what Eddie was thinking—and feeling—Gray allowed his own release to end before pushing Eddie away and flipping him on his back. While Eddie squirmed upward on the bed and tucked a pillow under his head so he could watch the proceedings from a ringside seat, Gray nestled eagerly between his strong legs, as Eddie had done to him. With his hands roaming everywhere at once, Gray once again took Eddie’s cock between his warm lips and swallowed it whole.

  Eddie rested his hands on Gray’s cheeks and observed the devouring of his cock. He had never experienced anything so sensual in his life. Gray’s eyes never once left his face. Gray’s hands never once stopped moving over Eddie’s skin, relishing the smooth parts of Eddie’s body, then moving to the furry parts as if he loved them even more.

  When Eddie tensed beneath him, Gray settled in with Eddie’s cock deep in his throat. His gentle fingers cupped Eddie’s balls one last time, and the sensation sent Eddie over the edge. His come exploded from him, filling Gray’s mouth. Gray lapped and swallowed and cried out once from the sheer joy of being a part of Eddie’s release.

  It was not until Eddie collapsed, spent and empty beneath him, that Gray crawled up the bed and tucked himself inside Eddie’s arms, his come-smeared face snuggling Eddie’s heaving chest.

  While Eddie’s heartbeat slowed and he got himself under control, he let his hands roam over Gray’s lean back, pulling him ever closer in his arms.

  It took him a long moment to find his voice. “I’ve wanted you since the first time I saw you.”

  Gray’s lips moved against his nipple, causing Eddie to shiver yet again. “I know,” Gray said. “I’ve wanted you too.”

  They lay in silence for a while, as if considering what they’d each said. Breathing softly, lost in his own private thoughts, Eddie relished Gray’s heat while listening to the storm batter the house around them. Eddie pressed a kiss to Gray’s hair, which was sticking up all over the place. More than likely, his own was as well.

  “I can still taste your come,” Gray whispered.

  Eddie closed his eyes and let the words sink through him. “I can taste you too.”

  Again, the sensation of Gray’s body held close eased Eddie into a comfortable, contented silence. When the bedroom began to grow cold, Eddie reached down to the foot of the bed and dragged the covers over them, never once letting the young man slip from his arms.

  “It looks like it finally took Louie to bring us together,” Eddie said. “I can’t believe he followed the trail all the way to your house.”

  “He came before the rain started,” Gray said. “I heard him whimpering at the door.”

 
“And you brought him home.”

  Gray sighed and buried his face deeper into Eddie’s chest. “I did it more for me than for him. I wanted to see you. And like I said, the storm hadn’t started yet. If I’d known I would practically drown along the way, I might have waited till morning.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t.”

  Blushing, Gray snickered and buried his face in Eddie’s armpit. “So am I.”

  Eddie laid his lips to Gray’s forehead while he gathered him tight under the covers. Gray’s hairy legs rubbing against his own felt heavenly. Gray’s sleeping cock pressed to his hip was beyond heavenly. In fact, he was starting to get hard again, but he was too damn comfortable to do anything about it. For now.

  Gray eased himself upward in the bed. Rising up on his elbows, he laid a kiss to the base of Eddie’s throat. When his tongue took a tentative swipe as well, Eddie smiled and wiggled around until he could claim Gray’s mouth in a proper kiss. That kiss—gentle, burning, tender—seemed to carry them deeper into this game they were playing. This game of learning about each other. Of sharing each other’s bodies. Of thoroughly enjoying this one incredible stormyass night. Not having the least idea what tomorrow would bring, and for the moment not caring one little bit.

  “Old man,” Gray mumbled in the dark.

  “Don’t be mean.”

  Gray bit back a giggle and buried his face in Eddie’s chest. “Sorry.”

  They lay in silence for a while, listening to the storm move away toward the mountains in the south. The lightning became little more than distant sparks on the horizon. The wind quieted, and at long last, the rain stopped pelting the windowpanes.

  “Sleep,” Eddie whispered, his lips still resting against Gray’s cheek. “Sleep with me.”

  Gray nodded and snuggled down close. The brush of his eyelashes told Eddie he had obediently closed his eyes.

  In their tiny cocoon of touch and taste and scent—and now memory—they lazily and contentedly drifted away from the storm, but not from each other.

  Gray lay wrapped in Eddie’s arms until sleep found them both. When Eddie awoke, still in the dead of night, Gray was still there, his breath warm on Eddie’s chest. It took Eddie a minute to realize Gray was awake as well.

  “You okay?” he asked softly.

  Gray nodded but didn’t speak. He squirmed closer. His lips found Eddie’s throat and began to move. A hardness pressed against Eddie’s thigh. Eddie’s breath hitched as his own cock began to swell.

  When Gray’s warm fingers slid around it, kneading and idly stroking, Eddie lost all sense of inhibition—not that he had much to begin with.

  This time they made love in a caressing cocoon of total darkness. And somehow, in that darkness, more secrets were shared than in the light.

  Afterward, as they lay in each other’s arms and sleep began to claim them for the second time, Eddie thought, This is how it should be. Just like this.

  They were the words that carried him into dreamless slumber. By morning he would not remember thinking them at all.

  But somewhere in the back of his mind, they would still be there. Whether he knew it or not.

  From that dawn forward they would always be there.

  “YOU’RE NOT young, you know. I can hear your arteries clogging up even as we speak.”

  Eddie’s eyes narrowed over the maple pastry he was gnawing at. On the plate in front of him were two more maple logs and a chocolate chip cookie. The cookie was the size of a hubcap.

  “Here we go with the ‘old man’ thing again. One night in my bed and the nagging begins. You young whippersnappers really get my goat, you know that?”

  Gray laughed and reached over to pillage Eddie’s plate, breaking off half the cookie and snatching it away.

  Watching with exaggerated horror, Eddie snarled. “And thievery too. Now you’re really asking for trouble.”

  They were sitting at the kitchen table naked. Eddie had pulled his chair all the way forward so their knees could touch below. Gray had asked for, and consumed, a ham sandwich, because he said he wasn’t much on sweets. Now here he was devouring Eddie’s four-dollar, store-bought cookie without so much as a please or thank you.

  Eddie glanced through the kitchen window. A second storm front had blown in. Now the only light in the house, aside from the occasional flash of lightning, was a candle burning on the kitchen counter. That was because the power had gone out about an hour ago and still hadn’t come back on.

  It was maybe an hour before dawn, but both men were wide-awake. The rain still sluiced down, and Eddie had the old gas furnace cranked up as high as it would go to warm the house. The dogs were lounging around close to the warm air flowing out of the floor vent in the corner. Louie had burrowed under Lucretia’s chin to keep warm, and Fred was snoring like a rhinoceros. The cats were nestled together in a multicolored puddle on the living room couch, their four tails fanned out around them like the blades on a pinwheel.

  Gray watched Eddie closely. There was a playfulness in his astonishingly pale eyes that Eddie had never seen before. Eddie liked to think he had been a wee bit instrumental in putting it there.

  “Reminds me of last night,” Gray said around a secretive smile.

  Eddie’s eyebrows shot up. “What does?”

  “That dribble of white custard that just squirted out of your maple log and landed on your chin.” Blood rushed to the back of Eddie’s neck, and his cheeks began to burn. A smile spread across his face, but there was nothing innocent about it. He figured they had gotten past the innocent stage hours ago, maybe right about the time Gray shot his second load of jism down Eddie’s throat.

  “I tried to keep up,” he said, waving a hand blithely through the air, “but you were coming like a race horse. A splash or two may have escaped in the turmoil. I can’t be everywhere at once, you know.”

  “I’ve never been to bed with anyone as old as you.”

  “You really are an asshole.”

  “I’ve never been to bed with anyone as sexy as you.”

  “Well, maybe not a total asshole.” Eddie paused to stare into Gray’s handsome face. Even his chewing stopped. Oddly, he began to grow serious despite himself. He wasn’t sure he was comfortable admitting to quite this much need at the moment, but he decided to ask anyway. “Did you really think I was sexy?”

  A fire had risen in Gray’s eyes. Eddie could almost feel the heat of it from where he sat. One of Gray’s hands slipped under the table and found a home on Eddie’s bare knee. His fingers were sticky with cookie crumbs and icing. Even that was a little exciting.

  “I still think you’re sexy, Eddie. Especially right now, with your mouth stuffed with twelve thousand calories and that glob of comelike custard dripping off your chin.”

  Eddie grabbed a napkin and wiped the custard away. He never once tried to escape Gray’s eyes. He found himself more than comfortable in their light. His heart gave a hitch, his maple log totally forgotten. “You were so beautiful,” he said softly. “Last night. You were amazing.”

  Gray’s eyes trailed away from Eddie’s face and landed on the window, through which a spear of lightning could be seen shooting across the desert sky. “You were horny. You’d have been just as happy bedding old Tommy at the hardware store.”

  “Now you’re being an asshole again.”

  Eddie reached across the table and coaxed Gray’s face toward him. His fingers lingered on the bristle of Gray’s beard, which had sprouted overnight. The nub of his strong chin. The delicacy of his flat little ear squeezed tight to the side of his head. A flurry of sensations rolled through him, sending shock waves from Eddie’s fingertips all the way up his arms, down his torso, and straight to his dick, which obediently twitched in anticipation. Like Eddie could really blame it.

  He searched desperately for something to say that didn’t make him sound like a lovesick wienie. “Did your mother name you Gray because of the color of your eyes?”

  “A Caucasian baby’s eyes are usually
blue, so no. It was just a fortuitous coincidence, if you want to look at it that way.”

  Thunder rumbled in the heavens. On the kitchen counter, the candle flame flickered.

  “It’s been a long time since I’ve been with anyone,” Gray said, abruptly changing the subject.

  Eddie nodded. “It’s been a long time for me too.” He pushed his plate away. “Suddenly it’s not food I’m hungry for.”

  A sexy, dreamy smile twisted Gray’s thin lips. “I’m hungry for you too.”

  Eddie closed his eyes when Gray’s fingers moved gently over his knee, bristling the hair there, tickling his skin. “You don’t have to say these things to please me, you know. I’m just feeling lucky you’re here at all.”

  Gray’s smile slipped away. “And I can’t feel the same?”

  “I’d be more apt to believe you if you weren’t so young.”

  “I’m twenty-five, Eddie. I’m old enough to know what I’m saying and old enough to be where I want to be and do what I want to do.”

  The timbre of Gray’s voice was so sexy Eddie’s cock stiffened even more. A tiny convulsion shook his frame. When he spoke, he tried to keep it playful, but it wasn’t easy. He suspected the huskiness in his voice would give him away, and he also suspected he didn’t much care if it did. “And what is it you want to do, exactly?”

  Gray pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. His beautiful young cock stood proudly erect. Eddie ached to reach across the table and slip his fingers around it. Or his lips.

  Gray’s voice was husky too. A splotch of red colored each cheek. “It’s not what I want to do, Eddie. It’s what I want you to do.”

  It was all Eddie could do to concentrate on Gray’s words because all the time he was speaking, he was watching Gray ease his way around the table, drawing nearer and nearer to Eddie’s chair.

  Eddie scooted his chair back from the table and turned to face Gray as Gray stepped up to him, slipping comfortably between Eddie’s outstretched legs. Eddie slid his arms around Gray’s waist and leaned forward to press his face into Gray’s warm stomach. Gray’s hands cupped the back of Eddie’s head and held him in place as he bent and pressed a kiss into Eddie’s hair.