by Amy Lane
Theo’s mad drained out of his body abruptly, and he leaned his head against Spencer’s arm, butting it gently.
“You haven’t exactly been letting me down, either,” Theo said softly. “I’ve loved the things we’ve been doing. What’s wrong with that?”
Spencer’s face remained a study of misery and avoidance. “It’s so easy for you,” he said. “This unconditional thing. When I was a kid, we were expected to produce things. You didn’t get a day out of school when you were sick. You either went to school or you helped with chores, and walking pneumonia was a thing. If what you were doing didn’t make babies, it was a sin, and any sort of work that you didn’t put your back into was charity and a scam. How you can even stand to look at me after all you’ve seen me do these last six weeks—I’m at a loss.”
Theo sighed and stood, grabbing the other office chair so he could sit next to Spencer, at least, if Spencer wouldn’t look him in the eyes.
“Is that how you felt about Glen when he was hurt?” he asked.
“Course not,” Spencer retorted. “That’s not the—”
“Oh, I think it is the point, but let’s get down to that unconditional thing, because I think you need lessons. I came out to my parents at twelve. My mother asked me if I had any crushes at school, and I told her that the boys at the high school were looking mighty fine, because I was raised right and we did not lie to our parents.”
Spencer snorted. “Your head would explode if you even tried,” he said, and he actually gave Theo a direct look before rolling his eyes, so Theo was encouraged.
“And my dad? Big John was legendary. He was huge—six feet five inches tall and two hundred and eighty-five pounds of muscle, with a little extra weight around the middle because he loved Mom’s cooking. If there was ever a scarier man to tell you were gayer than an Easter Parade, I have not seen him. But we were at the dinner table, where all truths were told, and he looked at me and smiled.”
“What’d he say?” Spencer asked, obviously sucked in.
“Well, first he asked if I’d come out to my classmates yet. I had not. Then he told me that when I did, if I did, I needed to remember all the things he’d taught me about throwing a punch and that he’d back me with the teachers if I needed it.”
Spencer gave a strained chuckle. “And that right there is where you got your practicality, I can see.”
Theo nodded, smiling fondly. His father had been such a good man. “It is. And then—I’ll never forget this—he said, ‘We only had one kid because I didn’t want your mother’s health to suffer, so we packed all our love into you, Theodore. That’s not going to turn off like a spigot. Not in life, not in death, most certainly not over this. There’s so many more important things about people than this. Just remember that. You’re not going to lose us because you’d rather crush on the quarterback than the cheerleaders.’ And that was it. And that’s what I’ve got for you right now. This thing between us, it’s bigger than… than all the sex things you think I’m not getting.”
Spencer let loose with an absolutely filthy laugh, and Theo smacked him on the arm. “That’s not what I meant, but yes, your cock is huge if that makes you feel better.”
He got a shy smile and Spencer’s flushed cheeks in return for that, and soldiered on. “Look, it’s not that I don’t want to try some more things, and it’s not even that I don’t think you’re ready for them now. It’s… what’s been building between us… I don’t know about you, but it truly feels so much bigger than bells and whistles.”
“I… I want you to feel like you’re mine,” Spencer said, and finally, finally, he looked at Theo, and his face—his heart—was so naked, Theo’s throat swelled.
“Look,” he managed thickly. “I know you’re stuck on the virgin thing, and what makes me a virgin or doesn’t, but I’ll tell you right now, I don’t feel like a virgin. I don’t feel like the same guy who got up the morning you fell out of the sky. I feel like a man who’s got a man in his life. I feel like someone who knows what lovemaking is. Yeah, we can go for some of the more advanced Stage 2 and 3 items in the sex parade, and they’ll be fun, I’m sure. But they’re not going to change how I feel about you, Spencer. Do you need me to spell it out?”
Spencer opened his mouth, and Theo couldn’t be sure if it was a yes or a no on the way, but at that moment, Elsie strode through the hangar, that amazing ground-eating, shoulder-swinging pilot’s strut no less intimidating on her than it was on any of the guys.
“We will resume this when we get home,” Theo said with dignity, and Spencer caught his hand.
For a moment, he searched Theo’s face with his eyes, maybe looking for Theo’s veracity, the truth he was trying to tell.
And then, regardless of Elsie looking on, he captured Theo’s chin with his fingers and leaned forward, pulling Theo into a deep, sweet kiss that left him breathless.
Spencer pulled away and struggled to his feet, using the desk and the chair and finally one of his crutches to get upright.
“You sure you can spare Theo?” he asked gruffly.
“Yeah,” she said, “but we’re going to need him tomorrow while you keep your surly ass home and heal, you understand?”
Spencer nodded, unusually compliant. “Yeah, Elsie. Tell Glen that’s understood.”
HE was quiet on the way back to the property, but Theo could tell by the clench to his jaw and the tightness around his eyes that he was battling the aftereffects of his collision with the tram. He stayed in the truck while Theo went grocery shopping and was fast asleep in the front when Theo came out.
Theo dropped him off at the trailer with two bags of groceries before running the rest of the supplies to Oscar and Belinda at the big house and going to get Colonel, who, when they weren’t home, stayed with Preston and Preacher or sometimes was kenneled when Preston was working with other dogs. When he got back, the groceries had been put away, and Spencer was lying on top of the sheets, fully clothed, fast asleep, with Stupid curled up against his neck because that’s where the dumbass cat liked to sleep when Spencer wasn’t awake enough to protest.
Spencer was not even close enough to being able to protest, and to prove it, Colonel peeked over the edge of the bed and licked his nose. Nope. No reaction.
Pain was exhausting, Theo thought, his heart in a vise. It was easy to forget, but it was so true. That included emotional pain, and Spencer had obviously been holding on to his depression about his injuries without talking to another soul for far too long.
Theo took off Spencer’s boots, tugging gently, and then, enjoying the blessing of familiarity, stripped off Spencer’s jeans too and checked his bandages.
They were still clean after Glen’s job earlier, and he left the leg alone. Curiously, as he was pulling the sheets out from under Spencer and wrapping them around his shoulders, he checked the bandage at Spencer’s side and found only a large Band-Aid in place, probably guarding the last of the healing from the stitches and the shunt they’d put in.
It was nearly completely healed, and Theo rubbed Spencer’s stomach softly in celebration.
Spencer hummed in his sleep, taking the corner of the blanket and gathering it around him as he rolled over, and Theo bent down and kissed his forehead.
“I’ll wake you before dinner,” he said.
“Okay.”
“Love you, you irritating bastard.” He froze for a minute, wondering if Spencer had heard, and if he had heard, would it startle him awake and send him screaming for parts unknown? But Spencer just huddled down closer into the blankets, protecting his vulnerable parts, keeping his heart warm.
“Love you, Woodchuck,” he mumbled, and then he was fast asleep.
Catch a Falling Pilot
THEO woke Spencer once to give him a pain med with a prune-juice chaser, which Spencer took obediently before falling back asleep. When he woke up later that afternoon, his shades had been pulled open and the sun was burning brazenly through his bedroom window. He glared at it irritably and
tried to recall what had awakened him.
And then he felt Theo—it had to be Theo—kissing sweetly at the nape of his neck.
“Mm?”
“Uh-huh,” Theo replied, and he scooted forward so his entire body was mashed up against Spencer’s back.
His naked body.
“Wha…?” Spencer struggled to sit up, but Theo put a heavy hand on his shoulder and whispered into his ear.
“Now I’ve put a little bit of preparation into what’s about to go down, big guy. You can wreck all that by going all inside your head and getting weird, or you can let me touch you and enjoy myself thoroughly. What’s it going to be?”
“Touch me?” It was supposed to be a question—as in, Spencer was asking what Theo’s plans were, but Theo took it as an order and tugged on his shoulder until Spencer was sprawled on his back. “Okay,” he muttered, and stared at Theo. “Can we close the—”
“No,” Theo told him, moving to take Spencer’s nearest nipple into his mouth. He tugged hard, because Spencer had told him that was the way he liked it, and then settled down to suck and tease with his tongue.
Spencer was abruptly awake and surprisingly aroused.
“Oolfohwhoamygod!” He tried to sit up but Theo put a hand in the center of his chest and kept sucking.
He pulled off when Spencer made a whimper of arousal and said, “How you feeling? Anything hurting? You all good?”
Spencer stared at him, completely out of his element, and Theo gave that bright, sunshiny smile of his and said, “Nope. You seem to be okay. Let’s have us some whoopee!”
“Whoopee?” Spencer gasped as Theo tore off the covers, revealing him in his briefs. “Whoo”—oh my God, he was peeling Spencer’s briefs off and—“pieohmygod!”
Theo had never put his mouth on Spencer before, but he did it now, extending his tongue, licking the head, grasping him in his hand.
Spencer’s aroused body was now going a hard ninety mph around a hairpin curve.
“Theo!” he cried out. “I’m—oh wow! Baby, slow down. Harder with your hand, but slower. Easy with your tongue. Oh God. Not so fast, okay?”
Theo pulled off long enough to grin up at him. “That’s what I’m talking about. Communication!”
“Ooooh….” Spencer whooshed out a breath as Theo’s words blew a soft stream of air across his wet cockhead. “Are you sure we can’t close the bli—oh!”
Theo took him all the way down to the back of his throat and then pulled off quickly, before he gagged. He couldn’t hold it there, probably because this was a new skill, but he did it again immediately, and Spencer saw stars and tried not to come.
“This is going to be over fast,” he panted, “unless you let me blow you first.”
Theo pulled in a breath and then… slowed down. Way down. Long, languorous licks. Slow, hard strokes. Spencer groaned softly and found a rhythm in Theo’s hand—sexy, yes, but something that could have lasted forever.
And it was that slowness that let him fall into it, gradually, cruising at sixty now, on a straightaway. Theo kept going like that as Spencer’s hunger to touch him, to pleasure him, built along with Spencer’s need.
“So, uh,” he panted, tunneling his fingers through Theo’s soft, short-cropped hair. “Can I, uh, return the favor?”
Theo pulled off again and smiled, taking his hand and lacing their fingers together.
“Yeah. But I need you to stay right there… and tell me if anything hurts.” He winked. “I have a plan.”
“Of course you have a plan,” Spencer grumbled. “God forbid we jump into bed without a—hey, hello. What are you—oh!”
Theo had risen to his knees and then—rather gracefully, which didn’t always happen when a man was naked and in bed—swung one of his knees over Spencer’s midsection and then knee-walked up so his bottom was even with Spencer’s chest.
And his, uhm, oh my goodness—
Spencer stared his generously sized cock directly in its one little eye.
“Hello,” he said, voice gruff. “I believe we’ve met.”
Theo reached down and caressed Spencer’s cheeks, rubbing his lips with his thumb. “I have been dying to make love with you in the daylight, Spencer. If you have a better plan, let me know. I just figured I would hear less bullshit if I caught you by surprise.”
It was Spencer’s turn to grin up at him and wink.
And take Theo’s cock deeply into his mouth, devouring it, relishing the pressure in his throat, on his palate, enjoying the taste. Oh wow. This was more than a skill for him—it was a pleasure, and one he’d savored for most of his adult life.
But never so much as now.
He went slow at first, because he wanted it to last, and he reached up to span Theo’s narrow hips with his hands. Theo was fumbling with something on the dressing table, but for a few moments, Spencer lost himself in the give and take of sucking cock and straight up didn’t care.
And then he realized that Theo’s body was slightly twisted, and he was doing something with his fingers behind him.
He pulled back and frowned. “What are you… lube?” Almost automatically he stuck out his tongue and lapped, so that little head didn’t lose interest. “Aren’t we missing something there, Woodchuck?”
“Nope,” Theo said. “I know your status is negative because I’ve been picking up your prescriptions, and you would have told me when we first met because you were bleeding everywhere.”
Spencer lapped at him again, not bothering to contradict him. “Yeah, but—”
“And you know I’ve never done this before.”
Spencer had to suck on him one more time. He took Theo down until he felt that abundant patch of brown curly hair tickling his lips and then pulled back, knowing his face was a sloppy mess and not caring. He came up for air, hungering for Theo’s come, and tried to remember what they were talking about.
“But….”
Theo did that thing again, cupping Spencer’s cheek, rubbing his lips with a thumb. Spencer had to admit, it made him feel good. Made him feel… cared for.
Made him feel cherished.
“I don’t have a plan B, Spencer,” he said softly. “It’s like when you fished me out of the water with the barge pole and set us adrift at the same time. You had faith that we’d be saved. I have faith that you and I will make it. So don’t worry about you being first and last here. ’Cause I’m thinking that’s what it’s gonna be.”
Spencer closed his eyes, let the words sink in, and then pulled Theo into his mouth all the way to the root, until he couldn’t breathe, until he couldn’t think, until there was only Theo inside him and nothing else.
Theo pulled away, gasping, and then—careful of Spencer’s still-tender side—knee-walked backward until he was straddling Spencer’s hips. Spencer was still gasping for air, still hungering for Theo’s flesh deep in his throat, when Theo lowered himself down slowly, then reached behind him and grasped Spencer’s cock.
Spencer saw fireworks as he realized—truly—what Theo had been doing with the lubricant when he’d been twisting around during the blowjob.
“You were fingering yourself?” he gasped, and then Theo positioned Spencer’s cock right at the dimple of his slicked, stretched entrance and began to slowly lower himself.
“Yes!” Theo cried out, and Spencer wasn’t sure if that was an answer or an exclamation, and what was happening finally penetrated his brain.
“We’re fucking today? Wait—that’s what we’re…? Oh God!”
Theo kept lowering, and Spencer had to close his eyes against the tightness around his cockhead and the pressure against his shaft. And the heat. And the slickness. And the sweet, sweet dark—
“God, yes! Spencer!” Theo gave a moan and slid the final few inches, bottoming out on Spencer’s cock and sitting completely still for a moment, head thrown back, chest heaving, as Theo’s body adjusted to Spencer’s body, which was deeply seated where Spencer had yearned to be his entire goddamned life.
> “Theo?” he asked, his hips twitching a tad with the need to move. “You doing okay?”
“This is good,” Theo breathed. “Wow, stretching really helps. This didn’t hurt. It’s really sort of wonderful. I can do this all day!”
Spencer smoothed sweaty palms on the inside of Theo’s muscled thighs. “Baby, I can’t. I need to move. Can I move? Can you just lift yourself a few—oh wow—inches?”
Theo did, for once complying with a request without talking back, rocking forward so Spencer slid out of him, slowly, and then rocking back a little. And forward, and back, and forward, and back, and a little bit faster, and a little bit harder and forward and back and—
Oh my God! Theo was fucking Spencer’s cock with his ass, and Spencer was going to blow his load right then if he didn’t do something to help Theo along.
“Stay still,” he rasped. “Stay still and let me come to you. And you grab your cock and stroke. Is that a plan? I think that’s a plan. Okay, good—like that!” Theo stopped again, Spencer held inside by the bell of his head, and Spencer… well, Spencer used years of practice to do what he did best.
He fucked, hard and gloriously, slamming into Theo with all his strength, exulting in Theo’s shouted “Yes! Like that! God, keep fucking me!” more than he’d ever celebrated sex in his life. Theo said “fuck”!
Harder and harder, until Theo grabbed his own cock and stroked, his hand blurring, his head tilted back and sweat sheening his muscled torso, the beautiful line of his throat.
And again and again, until Spencer’s abs and thighs burned, and he thought his entire body was going to fly apart, and he had no choice but to close his eyes and let the darkness wash over him.
“I’m coming!” he cried hoarsely. “God, Theo, I’m coming—”
“Augh!”
He had his eyes closed, but he could feel the scalding spatter of come on his chest, his cheek, and across his stomach, and as he held on to Theo’s hips and stuttered inside him, for a moment the fap fap fap of Theo’s fist on his cock was the only sound in the room.
