Noah reached for his cock and wrapped his fingers around the base. He squeezed, intending to quell the surge of desire, but the bite of pain had Noah losing his mind. He stroked his cock and dragged the ancient memory of Ian’s lips up to the surface. The feel of his sunshine skin, the scent of his sweat, and the sound of Noah’s name on his lips. It had sounded like a prayer, all those years ago in the box of Ian’s truck under the stars when they’d first crossed the line from friends to lovers.
Noah used nothing but water to jerk his cock. The bite of friction gave him enough pain to remind himself that wanting this as much as he did was dangerous. There were a million reasons he shouldn’t be doing this, but the pleasure had him bracing himself on the shower wall with his free hand. His legs quaked and his orgasm tore out of him and he cried out.
The water swallowed everything Noah had to give. It muffled his voice and washed his release down the drain. Noah’s legs shook, and he killed the shower. He stepped out and wrapped his waist in a towel, then ran his shaking hands through his wet hair.
Ian was an addiction, Noah realized. And as long as he had access to him, Noah doubted he could stay away. There was nothing in this world that had made Noah stop wanting Ian. Time and distance had tried, but now, twenty years later, the proof of their failure had washed down the drain. Noah still didn’t know if he should want Ian after all this time, but the knowledge that he did no longer scared him. Maybe it should, but Noah was past caring.
His orgasm hadn’t slaked his desire for Ian, Noah discovered that the moment he pulled into the parking lot at Murphy’s and Ian was there already, climbing out of his truck. Now that he’d had a taste of pleasure with Ian on his mind, his body wanted more, and his heart wanted it all.
Noah was so fucked.
Chapter Fourteen
“I never thanked you for today.” Ian pulled the door to Murphy’s open for Noah.
“It wasn’t a big deal.”
“I’d have been there all night.” Ian led them to a table off to the side of the dance floor. Murphy’s was a typical bar. A bunch of tables, a dance floor, and a couple of pool tables. It wasn’t anything special, but they served decent food. It wouldn’t take much to draw the clientele to Ian and Bridget’s place when it opened. The decor in Murphy’s hadn’t been updated since it opened in the eighties.
The waitress came, and they ordered two beers. Noah checked his phone, but there were no texts from Jason or Daniel, so he assumed they were on their way.
“Your friends are nice.”
“They’re good guys,” Noah agreed.
“How did you meet them?”
“Daniel is my roommate from college, and Jason used to run the club we went to in the city.”
“The kink club.” Ian smirked, but a definite interest burned in his gaze.
“That’s right.” Noah took a sip of his beer after the waitress delivered it. It went down smooth and cold and was what he needed after a long, frustrating day. Especially if he must have this conversation. “Have you ever been to one?”
Ian shook his head, and something in Noah relaxed. He knew he hadn’t been the only man Ian had been with, but there was a pleasure in knowing if Noah were to take that next step, he’d be the only man Ian had ever knelt for.
“What are they like?”
Noah leaned back and conjured up the memories of his club days. “They’re great at first. Everything is new and fresh. Captivating. Intoxicating. It changes your perspective on what kinky means. It challenges your views on sex and consent. It changed me the first night. But the club scene isn’t my scene. Hasn’t been for a long time.”
“Why not?”
Noah shrugged. “It gets stale. I was with someone I met in the scene and we were going every weekend. He loved the social aspect of it. The submission was only half of what he liked about the lifestyle. He was far more extroverted than me, and enjoyed being there every weekend, meeting new people, and that’s the part I didn’t like about it. All the new people. It was a constant rotation. Sure, we had our core group of regulars, but there were a lot of tourists.” Noah shook his head, trying to rid himself of the memories.
“Tourists?”
“A term for people who go there for curiosity’s sake.”
“Weren’t you a tourist when you first went?”
“Touche.” Noah grinned. “And that’s why I left the club life behind. I get that everyone must start somewhere, but I didn’t enjoy the atmosphere of the clubs as much as I should, I guess. I like smaller groups. Private events.”
“And that’s why they meet at your house?”
Noah picked at the label on his beer. “That, and there’s not exactly a kink club nearby.”
“What kind of events would they want to have at the bar?”
Noah grinned. “You’re awful curious tonight, Ian.”
Ian seemed nonplussed. “I’m trying to figure you out, Noah.”
Noah’s hand tightened around the beer bottle. The cold glass grounded him, reminded him this was real. “What are you trying to figure out?”
“I’m trying to figure out what your kinks would be. What role you’d play. And I’m trying to figure out if your friends stood us up on purpose, or if you told them not to come.”
Noah laughed. “Daniel and Jason do what they want. If they stood us up, it’s because they decided to.”
“And the rest of it?”
Noah leaned forward. Their arms rested on the table, mere inches from each other, but the heat pulsed between them. The physical thrum of desire pulsed through him, beating out a steady rhythm of want. It built like a crescendo, each pulse more pronounced than the last.
“You want to know my kinks, Ian?” Noah was aware of the hard edge to his voice and the way it came naturally to him at moments like this when the tension sat thick like an elephant in the room.
Ian nodded and sipped at his beer. “Yeah. What do you like now, Noah? Whips? Chains? Bondage? Submission? Dominance?” Noah watched Ian’s Adam’s apple bob when he swallowed more beer, and he thought of dragging his teeth across it.
“My kink is having someone on their knees in front of me. I get pleasure from knowing they’re there because they want to be. I like giving them things they can’t get anywhere else.” His kink was Ian, bent over a chair with Noah’s hand around his throat and his teeth buried into his shoulder. His kink was Ian, naked in the shower, choking on Noah’s cock. His kink was the sound of Ian’s broken cries and desperate pleas for Noah. “The tools, the paddles and floggers, the bondage, all that stuff is fun, but it’s only part of the experience. The tools are a means to an end, not the end itself. I get off on giving someone so much pleasure they can’t stand it. And then I give them more until I’m all that exists for them.”
If Noah had never left. If he’d never discovered the club and all the things that went on there. If he’d never spent time on his knees before standing before men, holding their power in his hands, he’d still have somehow found his way to it. All those years ago, Noah remembered the way it felt when he took Ian’s cock in his hand and dragged him through ecstasy.