“Fine,” Alex said, sounding put out.
“Your enthusiasm alone is beyond price.”
Alex snorted, and Simon felt like the sarcasm had been well played. “You do realize this is probably going to end like my other relationships, right?”
“Oh?” Simon was staying true to his word and squeezing his eyes shut tight. “How did they end?”
“When I laughed,” Alex mumbled, probably taking off his T-shirt. “We got all serious and gazed into each other’s eyes, and they touched me and I laughed.” More movement, and then the covers were pulled back and the bed depressed. Alex’s solid, coiled-spring body snugged up against Simon’s, and Simon rolled over and pulled him closer.
“Can I open my eyes now?” he asked.
“Yes. Nothing to see—oh. Oh my!”
Simon chuffed a breath in his ear, trying not to laugh himself. “Oh my?” he murmured, repeating the sweep of his palm against Alex’s chest. Mm… oh! Little nipples in the palm of his hand.
“Just… oh!”
Simon had swept his hand lower, was palming Alex’s concave tummy. “Is that funny?” he asked solicitously. “Because if it’s funny, I can stop.”
“No!” Alex squeaked. “It wasn’t funny then, either. I just… oh!”
More caresses—this one starting by framing Alex’s throat, then running down the length of his torso, and stopping at the waistband of his briefs. Alex started to shift, his shoulders and ass rubbing against Simon’s front sensuously.
“Mm.” Simon licked the shell of his ear, then moved lower, taking the lobe between his lips and sucking. He swept his fingers under the elastic band of the boxer briefs and then moved his hand up again to knead one slight, well-defined pectoral.
“Then why did you laugh?” Simon purred.
“I just did—ah!” Alex practically jumped when Simon pinched a nipple. “It was hard, uhm, difficult to take things seriously when—oh God! Simon!”
He practically whimpered, but, Simon gloated, he wasn’t laughing.
“Go ahead and laugh,” he taunted. “It’s okay. My ego can take it.” He moved his hand to Alex’s other nipple and thrust his groin up against Alex’s backside.
“I don’t get swept away—ah!”
Simon pinched his nipple again, and again and again, and Alex rocked his hips. Simon ground up against him again and Alex pulled in a breath that sounded like a sob, thumping the mattress in front of him with his free hand.
“I don’t know what to do next!” he admitted. “I’m… I mean, I know what should happen next but—oh God, Simon!” he cried out, when Simon went after the first nipple.
Simon moved his mouth to Alex’s neck. “Just lie there,” Simon suggested, delighted with a warm, willing, wiggling Alex in his arms. “I’ll take care of it this time. Don’t worry.”
“Take care of wha—oh my God!”
Simon thrust his hand down the front of Alex’s boxer briefs and found his cock, erect and heavy, crushed up against his thigh. Simon gave it a strong stroke, aligning it across Alex’s abdomen while he nibbled on Alex’s neck some more.
“I’m going to push your undershorts off,” he said, his voice coming in little pants. “Don’t worry, I just want to stroke you.”
“Yeah, fine,” Alex muttered, and together they slid the offending fabric off his hips and down to where he could kick it off.
Simon didn’t give him a chance to rethink things when he’d settled back. Instead, he ran his hand down Alex’s hip and then grasped his cock again, stroking from the bottom up. It filled his fist so nicely he did it again, then finished by skating his thumb across the tip, catching the edge under the bell.
Alex moaned breathily. “That feels good,” he said, sounding humble. “Could you—God, yes. Thank you!”
Simon chuckled in his ear. “You can laugh while we do this, you know,” he teased.
“Sure, I’ll—ah! Simon!”
He kept stroking, grinding up against Alex’s backside every time Alex rippled against Simon’s groin.
“It’s that I’m not used to being touched and—oh God. Keep going.”
“Sure.”
Simon kept stroking, kept grinding, lost in the feel of Alex in his arms, in Alex’s breathless little cries as he tried to explain in broken sentences what seemed so very simple to Simon.
Alex had never made love before because he’d never been in love before. When he’d asked for passion, he’d been lying to himself. Alex wasn’t a bend-over-and-go kind of man. He took things seriously—his friends, his job, his environment, his craft, even his friends’ dog. He wouldn’t let a casual lover touch him like this.
It had to be someone he trusted.
Someone he cared for.
Someone he could love.
Sure, they’d been crushing on each other at the office because they’d been attracted, but the attraction had stuck because they’d genuinely liked each other. Simon respected Alex’s fine mind, his loyalty, his sly and unexpected humor, and the kindness he’d shown his friends, the shy Bartholomew and the struggling Jordan in particular.
And God knows what Alex saw in Simon, but it must have been something good because he trusted Simon to touch his body, to stroke his arousal, to hold his desire in the palm of a strong hand.
Simon wasn’t a betting man—he was an accountant. But he was pretty sure if he looked back at the ledgers of Alex’s personal experience, he wouldn’t find one person who had seen the potential for wonder that Alex Kennedy held in his slight, wiry body.
Simon saw it. Simon would unleash it on the world if he could, as long as he could have moments like this one—this private, harsh-breathed moment—exclusively to himself.
“Ah!” Alex’s cry pulled him away from his thoughts and back into their bed. Alex gripped his fist with a shaking hand and pressed, telling Simon to squeeze harder, and Simon thrust his aching erection up against Alex’s backside.
“Simon, I’m going to—oh God, I’m gonna—”
“Go ahead,” Simon told him, sucking on his earlobe, ending with a bite. “Come.”
The sound that tore out of Alex’s throat just then was not dignified, and it wasn’t laughter. It was raw and needy, and Alex thrust into Simon’s fist one more time and spilled, hot, silky, and salty, over Simon’s knuckles, dripping down his wrist.
The feel of it, the carnality, sent Simon over, and he bit Alex’s shoulder and thrust one more time against Alex’s backside, coming inside his boxers with an unashamed moan.
“God!” he breathed. “Alex, you’re amazing.”
“Is that jizz on your hand?” Alex asked, sounding dazed.
Simon chuckled and raised the hand to Alex’s mouth, whispering, “Taste,” in his ear. And Alex stuck out a tentative tongue and licked, then licked some more, then sucked on the webbing between Simon’s thumb and forefinger and then licked the back of his knuckles, nursing on the side of Simon’s finger like he was milking a cock.
And the thought made Simon hard again.
He began to whisper in Alex’s ear, filthy, sensual suggestions, words that were offensive anywhere but the bedroom, when he wanted to arouse a lover.