Chapter 13
Thirteen
Some problems took decades to solve and there were problems that had yet to be revealed, but for Elio, his problem with Milo was immediately obvious when he awoke and prepared to go to work at eight in the morning.
“Your lift has arrived,” Elio had joked when he walked Milo out and said “goodnight” at the elevators. “Thank you for listening,” he said gratefully.
“Thank you for—everything!” Milo was drowsy but smiling as he stretched toward Elio for a kiss.
“Everything” was an understatement, so much had happened and so much had changed. Elio laughed softly as he pecked at Milo’s lips. “Try to get some sleep. I’ll see you later.”
“Can’t wait!” Milo hugged Elio tightly before they parted, smiling and waving as the doors closed. He was just as cheerful and ready to tackle their project when Elio appeared at Starlight, albeit a bit surprised. “It’s a quarter after nine! What are you doing here so early?”
“I was up and I wanted to get to work,” Elio had lied, then spent the rest of the day fighting the urge to follow Milo like a puppy dog.
He got nothing done and could only think of how incredible Milo had tasted and the sexy noises he made while Elio sucked him off. And that tattoo! It haunted Elio, he wanted to see it again and kiss it, it was so precious and perfectly Milo.
“Have you listened to a thing I’ve said?” Milo asked, laughing as he waved a hand in front of Elio’s face. They were eating lunch on the floor, an impromptu picnic while they sifted through past papers and published findings.
“Sorry, my mind’s elsewhere,” Elio murmured, frustrated with himself for getting up early just to be a useless tit and make an arse out of himself. “Stuck on that circuit,” he said and Milo shushed him before taking a quick look around and kissing Elio on the cheek.
“It’s okay to take a break,” he whispered, breaking Elio’s brain.
He wanted to throw himself at Milo and kiss him senseless. “That’s a good idea,” Elio grumbled and checked his watch. “I’m supposed to meet Felicity for coffee later but I think I’ll take off now. I could use a long ride to clear my head.”
“Perfect! I’ll help Seth clean this up and putter on the touch screen,” Milo decided and Elio fled while he was happily entertained.
A few hours on his skateboard or climbing and jumping from building-to-building never failed to soothe and inspire Elio.
But his mind wouldn’t deviate from its new obsession and Elio’s curiosity was carnal, not academically based.
He had been short and distracted with Felicity, blaming it on work.
She forgave Elio after he promised to meet her again for coffee on Friday.
Elio stayed away from the institute for the rest of the day and considered turning around when he spotted Milo in the foyer at the Olympia but they had made eye contact. He returned Milo’s cheerful wave and braced himself as he headed for the elevators.
“Going up?” Milo asked playfully.
The doors opened and Elio gestured for him to go first. Once inside, Elio pressed the six and took out his phone, avoiding more eye contact and hopefully, a conversation. But Milo waited for the doors to shut and slid closer, smiling up at Elio.
“We kicked butt today!” he boasted as his neck stretched and his lips pursed. “It wasn’t weird. I thought it would be weird but it wasn’t.” His eyes closed and Elio realized Milo wanted a kiss.
Wary, but unable to resist, Elio lowered his head and cupped Milo’s cheek, pressing their lips together. “You kicked butt. I was a useless tit.”
He tried to straighten but Milo grabbed the front of his jacket.
“Wait! You did great,” he said when the elevator came to a halt on the sixth floor and the doors opened.
Elio thought it was precious, the way Milo’s nose wrinkled as he blushed and mustered his courage.
“Could you…?” He raised his brows and widened his eyes, silently conveying the rest of his request.
“Could I what?” Elio replied, causing Milo to whisper a tiny “Help!”
“Um…” Milo swallowed loudly and leaned in, offering his lips again. “Would you kiss me?”
Elio frowned but nodded faintly as he hooked a finger under Milo’s chin. “I just did.”
“I know!” Milo laughed shakily. “But it wasn’t…a real kiss. I’ve never kissed anyone but my mom, my dads, and Luna, and I wanted to know what the other kind of kiss was like,” he babbled, his hands twisting in Elio’s coat and T-shirt as he rose on his toes.
“Never?” Elio gasped in horror—at himself—because it was obvious. He would have known that Milo had never been kissed if he had stopped and thought about what he was doing before. Now, Elio felt like a pig and the very last person Milo should trust his first kiss or anything else with.
“Who would I have kissed?” Milo laughed, bubbly and innocently curious as he waited for Elio to kiss him.
And Elio wanted to kiss him. Badly. But he was so bothered because he’d done things in the wrong order with Milo.
Elio should have kissed him first and slowly introduced Milo to intimacy and pleasure.
He’d had the good sense to be gentle, not wanting to overstimulate or overwhelm Milo, but Elio had skipped over all the special, romantic bits and went straight for what he wanted.
“I don’t know,” Elio said as he took in Milo’s full, pouting lips and the obscenely long eyelashes spreading across his cheeks, suddenly overwhelmed himself.
He wanted so much more than a kiss, Elio wanted to witness Milo’s wonder as he explored more firsts and experienced new levels of pleasure.
“Maybe we shouldn’t,” he said with a pained hiss, shaking his head.
“That’s not why I’m here,” Elio recalled, speaking more to himself as he set Milo away from him.
“I need to focus on my work. I can’t afford to get distracted.
” He gave himself a stern nod, then winced at Milo.
“And you should save your first ‘real’ kiss for someone better, who will take his time and make you the center of his world.”
For a moment, Elio’s world collapsed and the warmth was sucked from the elevator as Milo’s lip wobbled and his shoulders sagged.
“Okay. You’re right,” he said in a small voice, his gaze lowering to the floor as he nodded, making Elio feel like absolute hell.
“I didn’t think you’d be interested in me like that but then we—” he covered his face, whimpering at himself for being stupid and a baby.
“Milo, I would be—I am— but I…” Elio didn’t know where to begin.
He would have to be a fool to let someone like Milo Ashby slip through his fingers but Elio was the wrong man for so many reasons.
Mainly, he was too obsessed with his work and himself to remember that Milo deserved to be kissed—properly—before his clothes were ripped off and anything else was touched.
“I’m a clueless, self-absorbed prat, and you deserve more. ”
Milo shook his head and didn’t look at Elio as he shoved him out of the elevator. “I have to go.” He lunged for the buttons and hit the eight, shielding his face as the doors closed.
“I’m very sorry, Milo,” Elio called and made an exploding sound as his cheeks puffed out. He turned when he heard a soft cough and swore when he found Matteo leaning against the door to 6A.
“I’m afraid to ask what that’s about,” Matteo said but there was a hard, accusative edge to his tone.
Elio didn’t need to hear that Milo Ashby was practically family now and should have been off limits. At a minimum, handled with extreme care. Elio had treated him with extreme care until things got out of hand and he went down on Milo.
“Then don’t,” Elio said and gestured at the keys in Matteo’s hand.
He unlocked the door and pushed it open, then followed Elio inside.
“I have groceries coming because I know you won’t have any,” he said with a displeased grunt at the sitting room.
“It’s not as bad as I was expecting but I was hoping you’d discover hampers as you unraveled the mysteries of the universe. ”
“Why would I bother with learning about laundry? Plenty of people have already mastered that.” Elio headed for the board in the sitting room to scribble down a thought he had on their P versus NP research, tossing his skateboard on the sofa.
It was protected by crumpled reports and Elio’s laundry but Matteo clicked his teeth as he hurried to save the upholstery.
“Have you run out of clean clothes yet?” Matteo asked when he reappeared a few minutes later with a basket, stuffing jeans and T-shirts into it as he made his way through the sitting room.
Elio smirked at the board. “Not yet. I figure I have another week left.”
“I’ll send all of this out to be cleaned since you won’t but Muriel will murder you and hide your body somewhere in this building if she comes home and sees the place like this.”
“I’m certain Leo would warn me if she was imminent, to avoid that very thing.”
“You’re probably right, but look!” Matteo dropped the laundry basket and waved at the room. All the clothes were gone and the tennis balls had been gathered in a smaller basket on the sideboard. “How long did that take?”
“Very impressive,” Elio murmured as he turned back to the board. “Not as impressive as solving P versus NP or worth a million dollars,” he said while mentally plotting a Euler diagram of the problem.
“Was auch immer,” Matteo said with a dismissive wave, then reclined in one of the armchairs. “How bad are things with Milo?”
“Bad?” Elio pretended he didn’t know what Matteo was referring to, hoping he’d take a hint.
“Can we smooth this over with an apology to Giles and Claire or will we be shunned at family gatherings?”
Elio cringed at the board. “I don’t think we’re in the realm of apologies yet. I may have avoided a wider disaster, but Milo might be upset with me,” he worried and Matteo straightened, his expression severe.
“Did you lead him on?”