Irons and Works: The Complete Series

by E M Lindsey

  Basil reached between them, gently pulling his hand down until it made contact with his hard cock, and he thrust into it. Derek let out a puff of air, then he shoved his hand into the waistband of Basil’s boxers and took Basil’s cock into the palm of his hand. It was rough, and a little too dry, and also perfect enough Basil wanted to cry—or maybe scream and then come.

  But he wanted more than this, he wanted everything. He wanted to feel Derek on top of him, and inside him, and he wanted to be inside, and he wanted Derek’s mouth on him. He felt his lips forming a word, his throat vibrating with it. “Please.”

  Derek’s entire body jolted at the sound, and then he used both hands to tug Basil’s boxers to his knees, over his ankles, flinging them across the room with purpose. He nosed up his thigh, his moan vibrating against Basil’s skin, and then wet heat enveloped him as Derek swallowed him down in one go.

  “Uhgf,” Basil groaned, his head tipped back. It took everything in him to keep from thrusting as Derek used his tongue to draw a line up the underside of his cock. He pulled back, suckling the head for a minute, eventually drawing away as he licked precome off his bottom lip.

  ‘I want,’ Derek signed, then dragged his hand down the back of Basil’s crooked thigh and palmed the side of his ass.

  Basil nodded frantically, turning on his side to dig out his lube and condoms. They were new, and he saw the slight amusement in Derek’s eyes as his nails tore at the packaging, sending the plastic wrap to the floor. Basil’s breath stuttered in his chest as Derek’s fingers went shiny with the silicone slick, and then his eyes slammed shut at the first press of a finger.

  He expected Derek to take a long time, to torture him, to ignore the desperation of the moment and be sweet—which would have been fine, though it wasn’t what he wanted. He appreciated being wrong in this case when, after only a moment, a second finger joined Derek’s first. Then a third after only a couple of strokes. Basil felt stretched out and sore and on the verge of begging if Derek didn’t get on with it.

  He lifted his leg higher, trying to telegraph his wants, and he let Derek grip the back of his thigh and push his leg higher, resting his calf over his shoulder. His free hand lifted the condom to his mouth, tore the wrapping, then finally pulled his hand out to hold his dick steady so he could roll it on.

  Basil braced himself, willing himself to relax as he felt the first push of Derek’s cock head. He reached for him, gripping him by the hips, refusing to break eye contact because he wanted to drink in every single second of Derek’s blissed-out expression. The way his cheeks were pink, the way his eyes were half-lidded and all pupil. The way his mouth hung partway open like he was trying to catch his breath.

  Basil urged him in further with a tug, and Derek complied with a firm thrust. The lube made the way slick and easy, even if it was impossibly tight, even if he felt impossibly full, and god…god, this was the moment he’d been waiting for. It wasn’t angels singing or the heavens parting with holy light. It didn’t even really feel that good—except that it was Derek and he was joined with him, and that—that—was what he’d needed all this time.

  “Yes,” he felt himself say. “Derek.”

  Derek’s cock throbbed inside him, and his hips stuttered midway through his thrust, and his eyes flew wide open to meet Basil’s. He lifted one hand away from where he was pressing his palm to the bed and he curled his two middle fingers toward his palm, the other three out. ‘I love you.’

  Basil returned the sign, then put one hand on Derek’s shoulder, drawing him down for a kiss, and curled the other around his dick and stroked as Derek’s tongue fucked into his mouth. The sensations from all sides were enough to send him careening over the edge. He felt the orgasm tear out of him along with the moan which Derek caught in his mouth.

  As Basil’s body tensed, his cock spurting between them, he felt Derek’s hips slam against him again, and again, and again. And then he was coming too. Derek slammed his lips down over Basil’s, his hands holding Basil by the hips as he pressed in deep—deeper than anyone had ever been—and filled the condom.

  Basil was only half aware when it was over, still trying to regain his composure as Derek gently pulled out and rolled to the side. He came to fully when he felt a warm, wet cloth brushing over his chest and stomach, and his bleary eyes searched out Derek’s face. He found the love there, still flushed from passion, his eyes soft. It was like every remaining wall between them had crumpled, and though Basil wasn’t foolish enough to think it would be perfect forever, he knew that as long as they worked for it, they would be able to keep it.

  Derek tossed the towel to the floor, then let himself curl into Basil, both of them facing each other with a scant few inches for signing space, but it was fine. They didn’t need words—spoken with mouths or hands—to know that this was right. They would always be a bit of a mess, he knew. Derek would likely never heal—not completely—from the cruelty his father had shown him for far too many years. And Basil would never fully trust the world Derek belonged to. But there was a common ground between them, and it was right there in that bed, right there with each other. When one stumbled, the other would reach out a hand, and that was exactly enough.

  Epilogue

  Derek felt something rising in him—a sense of nostalgia he had experienced so few times in his life that it almost frightened him. Almost nothing had changed about the cottage built right on the banks of the lake, down to the pale rocks that lined the driveway, or the sea-foam green his mother had painted the front door.

  It had been maintained over the years, and rented out, he suspected. Yet it was like stepping back in time to his childhood and the brief escape from being terrorized by his angry father at home. He could almost hear his mother’s laughter—such a rare oddity that as a child, he wasn’t sure how to feel about it. He could even see the softness in his father’s eyes, and he remembered thinking once—only once—that maybe the man actually had loved her.

  Derek had stopped wondering a long time ago whether or not his father was capable of real human emotion, but he knew that there had been someone other than a monster once, long before his father had decided what family he wanted to present to the world. Maybe the old man always knew where to hit him that no one else would see, or exactly what to whisper which would make Derek instantly quiet and too terrified to talk back, but maybe not. Maybe it was a carefully cultivated goal and trial and error that he just never understood growing up.

  Whatever it was, it didn’t exist here. Not now. Not with Basil’s hand gently wrapped around his. The noise of their feet on the gravel was enough to overwhelm him, but it was a short walk from the rented car to the front porch, and inside was blissfully quiet. A faint floral scent lingered in the foyer, a long-dead bouquet waiting to be swapped out with a new one, but Derek had dismissed the caretaking staff for the week because he wanted this to be them and only them.

  Part of him felt a pang of grief that Sage wasn’t there to share in this moment with him, but his brother was caught up in the building of the new halfway house, and interviewing staff and organizations that would help with the caregiving for teens needing a place to go. They didn’t have enough money or resources for what Derek and Sage both really wanted—to ensure no teen in their position ever went hungry, but it was a start. At the very least, it was a start.

  He felt a slight tug on his hand, and he looked over at Basil who was staring out the front window which overlooked the massive lake. There were a handful of people out on jet-skis, and a couple of rowboats toward the middle. He could see five other cottages on the right side, and three to the left. But the woods were thicker and obscured most of the side-view, giving them a sense of privacy which was what he was craving.

  It had been eight long months since his father died. Eight long months since he’d pinned Basil to the bed and pressed inside him and told him he loved him for the first time. He’d always been warned not to say it during sex—it would mean less, it wouldn’t be real. But De
rek had come to discover that most advice about love was bullshit, and he was done following what other people thought he should do. His heart had stopped leading him astray the night he met Basil, and he was willing to give his instinct the benefit of the doubt.

  Which was why he had a little box tucked away in his case, buried under a pair of ugly yellow socks Basil wouldn’t go near. He wouldn’t take it out right away. No, not immediately. They’d do other things first. Like he’d set up his easel and paints and try to capture how the place made him feel—the good and the bad, the cowardly and the brave. He and Basil would take out a pontoon boat and try to fish. They’d go into town and shop at the farmer’s market and hold hands in public and kiss, and Derek would give exactly zero fucks about what anyone else thought.

  Home waited for them just on the horizon—with obligations, with his degree just around the bend, and with Basil trying to figure out if the shop really was his end-game. Derek would keep taking his ASL classes in spite of using it every day with Basil because he was dedicated, and he wanted to encourage everyone else in the shop to keep going.

  He’d keep putting his mark on random strangers he’d never see again and go to bed knowing that he’d made a difference in the world, even if it was superficial in the form of an infinity symbol on the inside of a twenty-year-old’s middle finger.

  It was just life. Everyone had their paths to walk, and that was fine.

  ‘You okay?’ Basil asked, interrupting his thoughts.

  Derek smiled as he grabbed Basil by the waist, spinning him and pressing him to the glass which led to the wrap-around porch. He loved the quiet, unassuming noises Basil made with him now that he wasn’t trying everything in his power to keep from letting his throat give way to involuntary sound, and he couldn’t help but lean down and kiss him.

  Their gazes locked, and Derek traced his finger down the side of Basil’s jaw before nodding his fist. ‘Yes. Yes. I’m perfect.’

  Basil smiled at him, the sun glinting off the side of his face, and Derek smiled back.

  * * *

  The End.

  Book Two

  Blank Canvas

  Irons and Works: Book Two

  It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.

  Audre Lorde

  Chapter One

  Part of Sam would always be unsure if waking up without the use of his legs was the worst part of

  his accident, or if it was the reaction of his parents. He’d spent a week in a medically induced coma, but he was fairly sure the nurses had failed to mention to his parents that they’d been bringing him slowly out of it. He’d been coming to in fits and bursts, and though his eyes wouldn’t quite open yet, he was aware of the conversations around him.

  “So, you’re telling me my son is going to be crippled the rest of his life? He won’t be able to walk, play football again, be of use to anyone?”

  “Mr. Braga, you’re understandably upset, but that kind of attitude isn’t going to help your son when he wakes up. He’s going to need the support of his family if he wants any success.”

  “What the hell kind of success is that boy gonna have stuck in a wheelchair all his life?” His father’s voice was indignant, disgusted, afraid. “Next you gonna tell me he needs a nurse to clean up his piss and shit? I mean, what are we talkin’ here? Adult diapers?”

  “We won’t know the extent of his limitations until he’s awake and healing. There are plenty of rehab facilities with great success rates in helping those with spinal cord injuries.”

  “And you expect me to pay for it?”

  Sam fell asleep after that. He didn’t forget his father’s words, but in that moment, he was too drugged up to care. Then he woke up five days later and became profoundly aware that from his hips down, there was nothing. No feeling, no movement, just like he’d been severed at the waist. Only, he could see his legs, his feet, his toes. He could see them, and his brain remembered how they were supposed to move, but no amount of effort could get even the tiniest wiggle.

  The next few days were a flurry of explanations that his fifteen-year-old brain couldn’t wrap around. Something about incomplete paralysis, and how he couldn’t feel things now, but it might not last forever. Doctors and nurses told him that there was no telling what the future was like, but how his life before the accident was irrevocably over.

  A simple joy-ride with his idiot friends—because what was there to do in a shithole place like White Beach, Alaska— and his entire world turned upside down. He could see it in his parents’ eyes. He was supposed to be something better than them. He’d be the American Dream. More successful, more intelligent, more wealthy. Just…more. He’d grown up being told by both of them that he wouldn’t end up working the rigs like his dad or scrounging around town for odd-jobs like his granddaddy. He’d go to college and make something of himself, and his wife wouldn’t clean hotel rooms for pennies an hour.

  He was meant to be the American Dream. Except, with one stupid decision, his dreams had been shattered along with his left hip, his right foot, and the base of his spine.

  He wasn’t a running-back anymore. He wasn’t a running anything. He was a kid in a wheelchair learning to shove a catheter up his dick so he didn’t piss himself during class. He was the kid learning to stimulate his bowels every morning with two fingers up his ass because his muscles didn’t work well enough for him to take a shit like he used to. He was the kid who couldn’t go to school for six weeks after leaving rehab because none of the doors were wide enough, and none of the stairs had ramps. They had an elevator, of course, but it hadn’t been serviced in ten years because the last time someone needed it was when the QB broke his ankle during the homecoming game a decade before his time.

  He didn’t lose status at school, at least. If anything, kids were even more excited to call themselves friends of the guy whose legs didn’t work anymore. By his senior year he was voted Prom King and had three full-page spreads in the yearbook about what an inspiration he was. He had stared at the page one night, reading a couple quotes from friends on the football team saying they were inspired by his strength. Never mind he’d dislodged his cath that morning and pissed all over the bathroom floor. He still hadn’t managed his balance well enough to clean it up, so he had to wait for his mom like he was a fucking toddler who had an accident in his pants. But sure, what an inspiration.

  He’d shoved the yearbook into the trash can and drenched it with the fifth of his dad’s whiskey he’d stolen the night before when his legs wouldn’t stop fucking spasming and his pain meds weren’t working for shit. He didn’t think twice about lighting it up. He didn’t give two shits when the smoke alarms started blaring and his mom was screaming and trying to get his almost-too wide chair out of his almost too narrow bedroom door before the entire place went up in flames.

  He saw the dead look on his parents’ faces when they put out the fire. He heard the exhaustion in their voices when they told him to, “Just go to bed, and we can talk about it in the morning.” Normally he would have just crashed on the sofa, except he couldn’t do that anymore because it was too narrow and every time he tried, he fell. So, he was stuck back in his room that was slightly damp, smelling of burnt photo paper and fire extinguisher, the black stain on the wall from the flames a harsh reminder that nothing was actually okay.

  And they wouldn’t talk about it in the morning. He knew that. Because he’d heard them from the living room trying and failing to speak in hushed voices. He heard the struggle in his mom’s voice when she cried. “I didn’t sign up for this. I didn’t sign up for a disabled kid.”

  And the sympathy for her in his dad’s voice when he replied, “I know, honey. And I just don’t know what to do.”

  Sam was fairly sure he understood why some people just grabbed their pills and swallowed them down like nothing else mattered in the world except making it all stop. But part of him wanted to live—he wanted to fin
d something that made him feel alive again, mostly to spite the two people who should have given him something to live for. He pretended not to notice the surprise and elation in their eyes when he told them he was accepted three-thousand miles away, to the University in Colorado on a full-ride scholarship.

  He pretended not to notice how helpful his mother was in packing him up, and how enthusiastic his father was in making sure his car was in good driving condition for the long trip across the country.

  And he pretended not to notice the way they didn’t tell him to call often, or to come home for the holidays. But that was fine. Really. It was fucking fine.

  Nothing really turned around for Sam until his Sophomore year when he got a job at the bookstore, and an irate guy with a stack of books came in with a determined look on his face like he was ready to wage war.

  The guy nearly dropped all the books in Sam’s lap when he recognized him. “Holy shit. Samuel Braga. Football star of White Beach.”

  Of course Sam knew the guy. His name was Antonio and he was three years older than Sam. They’d lived on the same street, their dads working on the same rig, and they’d been in each other’s periphery for most of his life. Tony had been long-gone by the time Sam’s truck rolled down the hill and into a ditch, and it was evident he had no idea about Sam’s accident until his gaze fixed on the sporty little wheels under his ass. Not much had changed about Tony, apart from a couple of eyebrow rings, and the fact that there was hardly an inch of skin on his arm not covered in tattoos. But his expression was still the same, just like the way he leaned over the counter and spoke without checking himself or fear that he might say something to break Sam’s fragile little heart.