12. Draven
Draven
S ometimes I swore it was as if Max wanted to be stalked.
There was the sign at the edge of his family’s property, for one. A little yellow sign that said Burnett Family , complete with a little arrow pointing up the beginning of their long dirt driveway.
This morning, the sky was overcast, and their land looked like the windswept plains of some old black-and-white movie, all of the grass gently blowing to one side in the breeze.
I brought my truck to a stop at the entrance to their land, pulling out my phone.
Draven
I’m here. Be awake. Put your clothes on. Or don’t.
Max Baby Blue
I’m awake, fuckface. Front door’s open.
See? You just leave your door unlocked for anybody to walk in.
You’re not just anybody. But good point. Maybe I should lock my door to you more than anyone else.
You like me too much to do that. See you in a sec.
I was only halfway down the dirt driveway when I saw the old white Subaru coming down the driveway. It was the car Lily was borrowing from her parents while she was here. The car pulled over beside me and I stopped again, and both of us rolled down our windows.
“Howdy, you,” I said.
She gave me a smile. Her eyes looked tired, and her long hair was up in a bun. “Fancy seeing you here.”
“Max needs help with something. You hanging in there with the wedding stuff?”
She pulled in a long breath. “T-minus 24 hours, just about,” she said. “Wedding is tomorrow.”
“Shit.”
“I need a gallon of coffee.”
“You headed to go meet your Bridezilla?”
Lily nodded. “Today is jam-packed. Rehearsal dinner later, but Casey is melting down, so I’m on the way to her house already.”
“She’s not Bridezilla, she’s like… Bride-flying-dragon, complete with breathing flames.”
After a moment she squinted at me, a dubious look on her face. “You’re going easy on Max, right?”
“Of course I am,” I said.
Her look got even more disbelieving. “My brother is a sweetheart. Don’t change that, okay?”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
I wanted to hate the fact that everyone’s first instinct about me was that I would fuck things up for any person who got near me.
But isn’t it true? The same fear I have in all my dreams?
“Just helping him set something up.”
She gave me a smile and a little wave before continuing on her way. My heart felt as heavy as an anvil when I saw the way Lily could still look at me like that—trust me like that—even after everything that had happened.
Too good to be anywhere near me. Just like her brother .
When I got to Max’s front door and swung it open, I found him inside the barn, pulling on a tight white T-shirt.
The fucker was clearly trying to torture me. The shirt fit snug against his muscles, and he looked like he was an off-duty actor from a superhero flick. Boy-next-door golden-brown hair, still a little messed up from sleep, a tight shirt like that, and shorts that hugged his ass.
And you liked coming in my mouth.
You liked it so fucking much.
“Knock much?” he asked.
“You told me it was open.”
“Still could give a guy a little warning.”
I puffed out a laugh. “You didn’t want the warning.”
He lifted an eyebrow at me. “Excuse me?”
Instinct flashed through me in a moment. I walked over to him and unceremoniously reached out to put a firm palm against his cock through the fabric of his shorts.
He was hard.
Not a half-chub, not a semi.
Hard for me.
Which certainly made me respond just as quickly, blood rushing to my dick like I was Pavlov’s dog to Max’s erections.
“See?” I told him. “You liked it.”
He groaned. “Fuck off.”
His hand came down onto the front of my jeans, pawing for my cock, too. “What point are you trying to prove? You’re just as hard.”
“Maybe it turns me on to catch you lying , just like it turns you on to catch me with my cock out.”
He let his palm slide away from my package, and I wished he’d have kept it right where it was.
He tried to glare at me, but I could tell he wasn’t really mad because he kept looking at my lips. Just like he had last night.
“I wasn’t lying. When did you hear me say, hi, Draven, good morning, and by the way, my cock is flaccid?”
I snorted. I gave his shaft one good, firm squeeze through the soft material of his shorts, then let it go. He let out a breath. I saw a hint of disappointment in his eyes.
I wanted to sink my cock into his mouth, and make him take it to his throat in a way I knew he’d learn to love.
Or maybe shove it into his ass and feel how tight he must be, inexperienced as he was, and watch his face flush as he learned to love the pain and the intense pleasure it would give him afterwards.
Bad, bad Draven. As usual.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ve got the system in the truck. One camera for the front, one for the back, and floodlights for each side of the place. We’ll be able to monitor them from anywhere, using your phone.”
He walked over to his kitchen counter and picked up a tall bottle, cocking his head at me. “ We? What do you mean we will be able to monitor them?”
“You and me. That’s what I mean.”
“You’re not going to have access to my house cameras.”
“Trust me, you’re going to want another pair of eyes on them for anytime you’re over at the Hard Spot.”
He was scooping protein powder into the tall bottle. “If I’m at the bar, then nobody is going to murder me from my house .”
“You really are too sweet for your own good.”
“Why?”
“They would wait for you at your house, then murder you once you got home. And I’m not going to let that happen.”
He looked at me like he wanted to bring a wide jab to the side of my face right about now. “I’m still not convinced that you won’t murder me in my fucking sleep,” he told me. “I don’t even want cameras, but if they have to be here, I’m going to be the one with control of them.”
“Anybody ever tell you how stubborn you are?”
“Only guys who swallow my cum.”
I bit down on my tongue. Before I could respond Max started his blender going with some godawful mixture of greens, protein, and fruits, the loud sound filling the air in his home.
I headed out and grabbed the equipment for the security system, bringing it out to the front porch and getting started on the installation.
I worked for about an hour in peace. The sky overhead was overcast, slowly darkening as the morning went on.
Max went for a run, and I worked in silence.
It was an easy setup for the cameras in the back and front, and after I’d gotten them in place I headed back inside to finish connecting them to the network.
Max was back soon after, sweat glistening all over as he breathed heavy after the run.
“That was quicker than I expected,” he said.
“Not quite finished yet. I need your phone.”
He pulled it out and tossed it next to where I was sitting on the couch. “Going to shower off.”
He disappeared into the bathroom and I heard the water running a moment later.
Max had left me with his unlocked phone and the temptation to check out his photos or leave a nude photo of my own was massive.
He was too trusting.
Exactly why he needed things like the security system in the first place.
I’d only been setting up the app on his phone for a minute before notifications started popping up at the top of his screen.
My eyes scanned over the private messages, all from people who were fans of his cocktail videos.
Some of them were the usual, normal type of comments that people left on recipe videos—saying they tried the drinks, or that Max was creative, or that the drink sounded weird but amazing.
My eyes skipped over those messages, though.
There were a few other ones that were a whole lot less innocent. That was what caught my attention.
“ Do you post on OnlyFans? Pls send feet or cock.”
“Hi big boy.”
“I’m visiting Tennessee, I will destroy your tight little twink ass at the Hard Spot, Cocktail Bro.”
My blood boiled when I saw the last one.
So many people knew exactly where Max worked, and some creeps would stop at nothing to get to him. He always acted so sweet and lightly flirty in all of his videos, and of course he always looked so good that it was only natural that anyone would want to lick every inch of him.
I clicked on the message from the last guy and went to his profile, my blood pressure rising the more I scrolled through his page.
He had quite a commenting history.
And a lot of it was on young men’s pages. But even more of it was on martial artists’ pages that seemed to be teaching people how to subdue other people.
The kind of things I used to study like it was my full-time job. I only ever grappled with people who were consenting to it, typically—people who wanted to fight just as much as I did.
But based on this commenter’s sloppy message history, I added him to the growing list of threats to Max.
Max had left the bathroom door open a crack. I headed over and started to push it open, then remembered the way he’d reacted this morning and reached up to knock instead.
Look how polite Bestens is making me .
“What?” he called out from the shower.
I pushed inside, entering the small, steam-filled room. He was behind the glass enclosure of the shower, which was fogged up with enough water that I couldn’t make out more than a vague image of his figure.
“Hey. We need to talk about something.”
“Can you give a guy five more minutes to shower?”
“You left the door open.”
“Yeah, to let out steam,” he said. “This bathroom was the last part of the barn renovation. I still need to put a little window in here for air.”
“I’ll look the other way, if you’re so modest.”
The water shut off and a moment later he slid the glass door wide open, giving me a pointed stare.
“Not modest,” he told me.
I got an eyeful of naked, wet Max, his tan skin dripping with water.
I reached out and pinched his nipple.
He smacked my hand away in an instant, grabbing a plush white towel on the wall nearby and rubbing it across his hair.
“Baby—”
“What do you need to talk about with me so badly that you barge in on my shower?” he interjected.