A gentle finger to his lips quieted him. Luis’s other hand moved to Paolo’s towel and loosened it enough to unwind it from Paolo’s waist. He brought it to Paolo’s chest and wiped away the water that still clung to his skin. “You never dry yourself.”
Though he was far from cold, Paolo shivered. “I forget.”
“Why?”
“It’s not important.”
“It’s cold, P. Of course it’s important.”
P. Luis had taken to calling Paolo that when his guard was down. When it was just them, bare skin and nothing else, or at work before the doors opened, and after, when they cleaned up side by side. It was intimate and yet so innocent, Paolo wanted to cry. He let Luis dry every inch of his damp skin and fought the urge to interrupt him with his own wandering hands. He’d learned this about Luis, that sometimes, when he wasn’t quite himself, focussing on Paolo seemed to help.
Besides, Paolo was powerless beneath his light touch. He shuddered and closed his eyes, slumping against the wall as his cock hardened and rose, chasing Luis’s electric palms. For long minutes, Luis evaded, exploring every inch of Paolo except where he needed him most. Then he closed his hand around Paolo’s dick and quickly found a rhythm that had Paolo lurching forward and bracing himself on the opposite wall of the narrow hallway.
Luis slipped into the small space behind him, still working Paolo’s cock. “Do you remember when you did this to me? When you turned me inside out with your hands and put your tongue in me?”
Paolo gasped, lost in the pleasure of Luis’s wicked touch and, at the same time, blindsided by the filthy turn their encounter had taken. He’d expected Luis to be quiet, silent even, not to kill him with dirty words and sinful hands. “I remember.”
“Good.” Luis nudged Paolo’s legs apart and sank to his knees. He kept his hand on Paolo’s cock and softly, like a dream, slipped his tongue inside Paolo.
“Fuck.” Paolo’s head dropped another inch, and his mouth fell open. Rimming Luis had turned his world upside down, but he’d never considered, despite Luis’s fondness for giving out skull-numbing blowjobs, that he might return the favour. Perhaps if he had, he’d have figured somewhere better than the dark hallway as a venue.
Not that it mattered. With his eyes screwed shut, Paolo couldn’t see a thing, not even Luis, with his face buried between Paolo’s legs. I need a mirror for this shit.
Luis drove Paolo wild with his tongue, teasing and light, it set his nerves on fire, only for the steady stroke of his hand on his dick to obliterate them. Paolo’s knees turned to jelly. He moaned loud enough for his neighbours to call the police and choked out a warning. “I’m gonna come, fuck, I’m gonna come so hard.”
The words had barely left his mouth when his limbs began to seize. White spots danced behind his eyelids, and he came with a harsh groan.
Luis eased off slowly, his hand first, then his tongue. He got to his feet and peeled Paolo from the wall. “Wanna go to bed?”
Paolo stared at him, lost for words despite having so many to say. He nodded and tried to put some semblance of himself back together, but he had nothing, and Luis had everything, even if he didn’t want it.
Luis led Paolo to his bedroom and sat him on the edge of his bed. He disappeared to the bathroom while Paolo lay down and gazed at the ceiling, wondering which way was up. He’d grown used to the crazy-hot chemistry he and Luis shared, but what had just happened was off the scale. And he never even took his clothes off.
The room was dark. Luis came back and ditched his T-shirt. He was wearing the soft sweatpants he lived in when he wasn’t wearing jeans. Paolo waited for him to take them off, but he didn’t. He rounded the bed and slipped under the covers.
Bemused, Paolo rolled to face him. Luis had already closed his eyes. Is that it? He’s just gonna show up and rim me into oblivion without a real conversation? Paolo had lived through worse dates, but nothing about Luis had ever been so trivial. He rolled over, showing his back to Luis in the hope that he’d follow and wrap his arms around him like he always did, as if Paolo was the only thing anchoring him to the earth.
Silence stretched out between them, and for long heartbeats, Luis didn’t move. Paolo began to drowse, pulled under by the brain zapping orgasm Luis had gifted him. I miss him already. If he’d ever been there at all.
16
“What even is that?” Paolo peered at the spray-painted symbol that had appeared on the pavement outside the cafe. “Is it a compass or a clock? Why has it got no hands? Do you think they forgot? Fucking kids.”
Luis pretended not to hear and busied himself with the ketchup bottles, hoping Paolo was thinking out loud rather than starting an actual conversation. He’d been good about that in recent days, leaving Luis alone with his thoughts while Luis distracted him with his hands and mouth, but Luis could tell the oppressive silence was getting to him. That as much as he was trying to understand something he knew nothing about, it wouldn’t be long before he snapped, and there wasn’t a rim job on earth that would deflect him then.
Paolo shut the cafe door. It was early, not even opening time yet, so he bolted it and came up behind Luis. For once, he didn’t slide his hand over Luis’s back to warn him he was coming. He didn’t do anything. Just stood there for a long moment before he walked away, not realising that Luis could see him in the reflection of the window.
Luis closed his eyes, mourning the lost touch, all the while steeling himself against the wave of relief that flooded him that Paolo hadn’t made the connection between Luis and the pocket watch tattooed on the concrete outside, the faceless clock letting Luis know, as if he could forget, that his days and nights with Paolo were numbered. So just leave already. It was a no brainer. If Luis wasn’t surgically attached to Paolo, it would be easier to keep him out of the mess Dante was trying to make.
At least that’s what Luis told himself every afternoon when he left work before Paolo and went home. But by nightfall, the pull to be with Paolo was too strong. Three nights in a row found him on Paolo’s doorstep, too strung out to do anything but let Paolo lead him to bed where they slept, wrapped up in each other until it was time to do it all over again. That was the easy part, but then, everything about being naked with Paolo was easy.
The cafe opened for business. By lunchtime, the council had showed up and painted over the pocket watch with crude red paint, leaving a mess far worse than the simple etching.
Paolo returned to the cafe door and scowled at the workers retreating from the sudden rainstorm. “Since when do the council come out and cover graffiti so quick?”
“Gang signs,” a customer from the nearest table replied. “They painted over it at the train station too. Funny how they can find the money for that, but not to treat the drug addicts these gangs create.”
Paolo shot the woman a sharp glance. “How do you know it’s a gang sign?”
The woman shrugged. “They were all over Moss Farm until last week. My son said it’s a prison thing, something to do with lost years. I asked him how he knew those things and sent him to school with a bible in his bag, let me tell you.”
She said other words and Paolo replied, but Luis really didn’t hear them this time, not because he turned his back on them and couldn’t follow their lips, but because of his thundering heartbeat. His hands had been shaky since he’d come round from that beatdown with the iron bar. The doctors said it was anxiety, not brain damage, and as Luis flailed over the grill, he finally accepted they might’ve been right.