Ross got up, turned out the lights, and set the lubricant and the other sex toy on the end table for possible use. Then he set his phone to wake him up in an hour—it wasn’t quite time to go to bed for him anyway—and settled himself back down, this time with Tenner in his arms and the covers over both of them.
“All good?” Tenner surprised him by saying softly. “Your territory all marked? Did you pee in the corners?”
Ross chuckled, burying his face against the back of Tenner’s neck and undulating his hips until his groin hit the plug, and Tenner caught his breath.
“I marked what I needed to,” he said mildly. “Be ready, okay?”
“I’ll be asleep,” Tenner slurred. “You be ready.”
“This time.”
But Tenner didn’t respond, and Ross figured he’d fallen asleep on that, which was fine. Because he didn’t want to admit the truth.
“Be ready” was empty posturing. Ross hadn’t been ready—not even close. He’d come here tonight for a romp, for some solid sex, for a challenge.
And Tenner had vanquished him, literally with both hands tied over his head, just by being honest and himself.
This man in his arms was solid and real, and he wasn’t going to quit his job or leave the child he’d already sacrificed for behind. And Ross wasn’t going to quit seeing him, quit trying to make nights like this happen, not while they were in the same town and had time.
Something was going to have to give, and it wasn’t flesh and it wasn’t sex, and it wasn’t a sock.
Ross lay awake until his alarm went off, thinking about what the future could look like. So many amorphous shapes, and they all depended on a man who couldn’t even tell the people in his life who Ross was.
He killed his phone and began to move practiced hands over Tenner’s body, picking up on the way Tenner undulated his hips, made little gasps under his breath, whimpered when Ross brushed his erogenous zones.
That was the best. Ross rolled him to his back again and was surprised when he saw Tenner’s eyes, glinting in the light from the window.
“Are you going to take me again?” he asked, arching his hips, thrusting.
“Do you want me to?” Ross licked his jaw, because everything was open to taste.
“Sure,” Tenner slurred. “All floaty… and a little sore.”
“Mm….” Ross kissed him. “Don’t worry, then. I’ll do you right.”
He kissed his way down Tenner’s body again, thinking he knew the path by now, but it was all so new, so delicious, he loved doing it again. When he got to Tenner’s cock, it was full, again, thrusting without urgency into the air.
Ross took it into his mouth and nursed it tenderly. There was no play here, no kink, no “beg me.” There was just Ross, giving Tenner everything he needed. Tenner moaned and thrust, no inhibitions holding him back from seeking pleasure, and Ross took his rocking motions and used them, bringing Tenner closer and closer to his peak.
As Tenner started fucking his mouth in earnest, Ross tugged gently on the plug, until the widest part was stretching him, and Tenner cried out, hands beating weakly on the coverlet. One more thrust, one more lick, one more tap on the plug, and when Tenner’s next cry turned into a hoarse shout, Ross pulled it out and Tenner came and came and came.
Ross got up to clean off the toy and returned to bed with a cloth. “How you doing, cowboy?” he asked when Tenner waved him off.
“Don’t leave,” Tenner mumbled.
“No.” Ross squeezed his eyes shut in the dark. “I can’t. You’re my ride.”
Tenner made a fuzzy sound and rolled into Ross’s chest. Ross gave up any more thoughts of cleanup.
Tenner was marked, like they’d joked about, but for real.
Oh God. This might have started as a quick fuck in a dark park, but Ross knew—and maybe Tenner knew now too—that this had never been playing around.
Double Hitter
TENNER STARED at the screen in front of him and saw absolutely nothing.
“Ten?” Pat said from his doorway. “Tenner? You there?”
Tenner shook himself and tried to concentrate on his work. It was hard when his body was so damned mellow. “Sorry, Pat,” he said, faking a little yawn. “Long day yesterday.”
“Turn off the alarm on your screen before we all kill you,” Pat said sternly, and Tenner really made an effort to snap himself into the present this time.
“Sorry, Pat,” he said sheepishly, hitting the alarm that said the test was run.
“Wow,” Pat said, shaking his head. “I mean… wow. I sort of knew Ross was, like, a sex shaman and everything, but I had no idea he had a magic penis. Did he tell you how much he paid for it? Was it in gold florins or cold hard cash?”
Tenner flailed and held his hands to his mouth and then his finger to his lips as he tried to remember how to shut a grown man up about stuff he should not be discussing at work!
“Do you want people to hear?” he growled.
Pat narrowed his eyes. “Don’t we already know you’re gay?”
Tenner frowned. “Only you?” He tried to think about the rest of his department, but he couldn’t remember. When he and Nina had split, there had been so much misery. He’d told Pat, and since Pat was his boss and his best friend, that had seemed like enough.
But according to Pat’s frown, it really wasn’t.
“You are despoiling my brother-in-law and you are not even out?” he hissed, outraged. “Tenner! That’s not fair to him!”
“Well, what am I supposed to do?” Tenner hissed back. “Stand up at the water cooler and scream ‘I’m gay’?”
I’m gay came out a lot louder than he’d intended, and as he and Pat stared at each other in horror, the rest of the office noise died down completely, and the world’s most awkward silence descended.
A tentative voice floated over the cubicle walls then. “Uh, Tenner? We know. We’ve known since the divorce. You and Patrick aren’t exactly quiet. It’s a cubicle. Can we all go back to work now?”
“Sure,” Tenner said, his voice strangled. He rested his forehead on his fist. “Do you have any ibuprofen?” he asked Pat miserably.
“Let me check my cubicle,” Pat said.
“Could you check it for cyanide? It might be more effective.” God, Tenner was just going to die of embarrassment on the spot.
“Suck it up, Tenner,” Pat said with the same tone of voice he must have used on all his children to get them to attack their first soccer ball. “You can tell me about Ross’s magic penis at lunch.”
Oh God. “Sure, but can we not do Indian food? It gives me gas.”
LUNCH PROVED to be decidedly less awkward. Pat had, predictably, wanted to check to make sure Tenner was okay, and Ross was okay, and everybody was all happy fine.
“So,” he asked, over a veggie burger and fries, much to Tenner’s relief, “are you okay with him leaving?”
Tenner’s own veggie burger went down a little harder than he’d anticipated. “Yeah. Sure. I guess I have to be.”