That was a comforting thought… one that finally let Hunter close his eyes to sleep.
No Room on the Fence
GRACE WOKE up slowly, unused to having another person in his bed.
Hunter slept sprawled out, one arm over Grace’s chest possessively. As Grace tried to wriggle out, that arm grew tighter, and Hunter turned his head and scowled, eyes still closed.
“Don’t go,” he rumbled.
“Bathroom,” Grace told him truthfully. “Shower.” There was a knock at the door. “Josh.”
Hunter cracked one eye. “Fine.”
Grace grimaced as he stood up, took two strides to the bathroom, grabbed a towel, then cinched it around his waist. He opened the door about two inches and peered out.
Josh peered back in. “Is he still there?” he asked bluntly.
“Yes. Why? Are you stealing him? Do you have to go do something dangerous? Are there bombs? Is he beating up a football team? What?”
“Breakfast as a group,” Josh said. “Then we get to go do whatever we want. Before we breakfast as a group, let me know if we can hang out with you guys or if you want us to fuck off and leave you alone. I’m game going to Grouse Mountain with Molly and my mother if you’re going to fuck off about it.”
Dylan frowned and looked behind him, not wanting Josh to fuck off. He liked going places with Josh and his mother. He liked being part of the secret club. Yesterday with Hunter had been really lovely, but he felt strange and alien in his own skin now and—
“Stop overthinking, Grace,” Hunter said on a yawn. “Sure, we’ll go to the damned mountain. What’s Stirling doing?”
And like his voice was some sort of key, Josh shouldered his way in.
“Oh my God!” Grace whined. “Boundaries!”
“You have actually interrupted me when I was in my room jerking off. More than once. With food. Your boundaries are meaningless,” Josh said. “How you doin’, Hunter?”
“I’m naked,” Hunter said dryly. “You’re freaking Grace out.”
“And it’s a day ending in Y. Grace, were you going somewhere?”
“The shower,” Grace told him, looking suspiciously from one man to the other. “Are you going to talk about me when I’m in there?”
Josh looked bored. “Yes. Because we always talk about you, because the world has never been about anybody else. So, Hunter, the Grace rose in the sky today and it’s looking like a Dylan Li sort of morning. How you doing?”
Hunter—the rat—smirked. “Well, after a hot cup of Grace, I’m thinking about having some breakfast and maybe putting on some Grace, and then we can all go up to Grace Mountain—which isn’t very tall, by the way—and me and Grace can—”
“Fuck you both!” Grace announced, but inwardly he was relieved. “I’m going to go shower.” And with that, he grabbed a pair of clean briefs and a T-shirt from his suitcase and stalked to the door.
He took his time—used the facilities, brushed his teeth, then showered and soaped his pits and creases. His asshole was a little stretched, and very well used, he thought as he fingered it in the shower. Touching himself made the tingle of arousal start up again, and he was transported back to the night before, when Hunter had… well, mastered him.
All of him. The bondage wasn’t something he’d ever done before, but ah, God! He’d wanted Hunter so bad. He wasn’t even used to beds. Walls, couches, back rooms, maybe, but beds? No. Being stretched out in front of those heated gray eyes, on display, helpless to do anything but accept touch—that had been as safe as Grace had felt in his entire life.
He’d seriously been thinking about escaping from the bathroom through the ventilation duct in the ceiling before Josh had crashed through the door.
Grace didn’t trust feeling safe. He didn’t trust a warm body in his bed in the morning. He didn’t trust that Hunter would even want to stay with him, although Grace had all but volunteered them for the whole family outing thing.
Because now that he’d been alone with Hunter and Hunter had been inside his body, he felt seen, as if Hunter had peered into his soul, and he was afraid to be alone with him again in case he’d noticed something he didn’t like.
Grace saw that shit all the time, and he wasn’t sure what to do about it.
He groaned and leaned his head against the shower wall, trying hard to shut his eyes against all the nameless guys and the drugs in high school and his way of sneaking into the homes of douchebags and walking out with things that would irritate them the most. Not emotional things. Practical things. He’d heard a girl make a shitty comment about Josh once and had stolen all of her stupid scrunchies and banana clips and her ceramic hot rollers. Watching her deal with her hair for the next week until her mom could get to the grocery store had been the only thing that kept him in school that month.
He heard the rattling of the locked doorknob and scowled, sticking his head out of the shower long enough to snap, “It’s locked for a reason, dildo. You cannot come in here and take a pi—oh.”
The jiggling stopped and Hunter walked in, completely naked, and set a serviceable lockpick on the counter. “I assume I can come in and take a piss?” he said mildly.
Grace tucked his head back into the shower and turned his back. “Piss away.”
He pretended he couldn’t hear it over the sound of the shower. A moment later, he pretended he couldn’t feel the curtain pull back and Hunter’s sleek, muscular body behind his.
Hunter wrapped his arms around Grace’s middle and rumbled in his ear. “Breakfast and then a family outing, like we’re a television family. You okay with that?”
Grace huffed. “Sure. Fine. Whatever.”
Hunter chuckled and rocked him back and forth in a way that was strangely soothing. “Good. I’m looking forward to this. Think of it like a team-building exercise for a company or something.”
That made Grace snort water. “We just did a team-building exercise. I had to steal and return the same rock in one night, and then there were electronics and stakeouts and whatever. We’re a team. We got exercise. Whatever.”
“This is different, and you know it,” Hunter said. He let out a sigh and made himself comfortable along Grace’s back again. “I don’t get to do these sorts of things with my boyfriends, you know.”
Augh! Guilt! “Why not?” Grace asked suspiciously.
“I’m a bodyguard, Grace. If I had girlfriends, they’d have to be tougher than I am, or I’d be putting them in danger. But I’ve got boyfriends, and if they’re not tougher than I am, that still puts them in danger. And if they are, I still can’t be seen in public with them. I won’t get any jobs because stupid people stereotype.”
Grace frowned. “But… but what if this doesn’t pan out? What if somebody sees you? What if… I don’t know, Felix and Danny split up again? What if Josh decides he wants to get laid and doesn’t want to help people anymore? What if—” Oh my God, oh my God, he couldn’t breathe! “—what if I ruin your life!”
He half expected Hunter to laugh him off, but he didn’t. Instead, he kept up that rocking motion, which, combined with the hot water, didn’t quite make Grace sleepy, but held him inside himself, with his feet on the ground.