Chapter 42
Forty-Two
Jason
We finish our meal but I’m not ready to give up on Victor’s company yet. It’s strange. I’ve spent the past fifteen years avoiding that very thing, but during that one week in Costa Rica, Victor’s burrowed under my skin and—what’s that the kids say?—now lives rent-free in my head.
Do the kids say that anymore? Whatever, it’s true that when I’m not agonizing about my career, I’m thinking about Victor. Of course, it’s also true that it’s in large part because of Victor that I’m agonizing about my career.
Not that this is all Victor’s fault. Would I be facing this dilemma about my faith and my sexuality if I hadn’t spent that week fucking him every chance I got?
Maybe, maybe not. I’ve never pursued (or been pursued by) another man before, and maybe Victor is the only man I’d ever want to pursue.
What I do know is that I want him. Not just for sex. For…everything. I just don’t know how to tell him that.
“Want to come back to the house with me?” I risk asking as we leave the restaurant. I’ve no idea if Victor has other plans today.
“I’d love to,” he says immediately. My shoulders drop under my coat and I realize I’ve been tensing them for who knows how long.
It’s a short walk to the house and we don’t speak much on the way. When I let us in and Barnaby comes to greet me and investigate this stranger entering his home, Victor stops in his tracks, a couple of steps inside.
“I forgot you said you had a dog.” He sounds delighted rather than disconcerted, so that’s a good thing.
He holds his hand out respectfully for Barnaby to sniff at, but then crouches down and promptly rubs all over Barnaby’s muzzle, neck, and shoulders.
“Hello, puppers, are you a good dog? Oh yeah, you are, aren’t you?
What a good dog you are,” and other such nonsense.
“Don’t get him all riled up,” I say, but obviously, it’s too late. Victor and Barnaby are romping around the living room, tussling and playing with each other like they’ve been best friends for years. “Go on, then. Outside, both of you.”
I point to the door in the kitchen that leads to the back deck and then down into the yard.
Barnaby leads Victor to the door and waits impatiently for him to open it.
Once outside, they bound down the deck stairs and race each other around the perimeter of the yard.
Victor finds a tennis ball and throws it four or five times for Barnaby to fetch, until he collapses at Victor’s feet, panting, a big doggy smile on his face.
“That’s it?” Victor says. “That’s all you got?”
I’m leaning on the deck railing, watching them. “He’s a retired racer. Greyhounds are built for short bursts of speed, not endurance. He’s got about five minutes of intense energy in him and then he naps like a cat the rest of the day.”
“That’s gotta be convenient for a dog in the city,” Victor says.
“Yeah,” I reply. “I mean, he’s big, but he hardly ever barks and he’s the laziest, most chill dog I’ve ever known.”
Barnaby rolls onto his back and Victor rubs all over his belly and sides. Barnaby squirms in joy. “I think you’ve made a friend for life, there,” I say.
Victor looks up at me, still rubbing my dog. “I hope so.”
My heart swells. What’s that expression—love me, love my dog? If Victor can fall instantly in love with my dog…
Victor stands and dusts his hands off. Barnaby rolls to his feet and heads for the stairs to the deck but then stops at the bottom and looks up at me. “You can do it,” I tell him. “I know you can.”
He puts one paw on the first step, then looks over at Victor.
“I had to teach him how to use stairs when I adopted him,” I say at Victor’s quizzical look. “He’s still not the biggest fan.”
“Wanna do them together?” Victor asks Barnaby. He positions himself next to Barnaby, hooks a finger in his collar, and plants one foot on the step next to Barnaby’s paw. “Ready?”
Victor takes the steps slowly, his finger in Barnaby’s collar gentle encouragement, rather than pulling on him, and Barnaby remembers that he is totally capable of using the stairs he’s had to use at least three times a day since I got him.
When they reach the top, I pet Barnaby’s head. “Good boy,” I tell him. At Victor’s forlorn look, I tell him, “Yes, you’re a good boy, too.”
“Do I get petting?” Victor asks, a glint in his eye and a wicked twist to his mouth.
“How about a blow job?” I counter, calling his bluff.
He blinks at me, then chuckles. “Never gonna turn that down.”
Barnaby drinks some water, then plunks himself down on his bed next to the sofa. He’ll be asleep in seconds, I know from experience, so I motion to Victor to follow me upstairs.
We’re going to do it proper this time. No frantic, furtive coupling on the living room rug. I’m going blow him and maybe fuck him in my bed with no shame or guilt about it.
Except when we get upstairs, I’m struck by the weirdness of having him in my bedroom.
I’ve long since cleared out Leah’s things, except for a few photos of her and a handful of items that are stored out of sight.
But I haven’t taken anyone to bed in this room since her, and Victor’s a large, sort of looming—and very male—presence who takes up a lot of space.
He seems to sense my hesitation and sits down on the end of the bed. I step closer to him and he spreads his legs apart to make room for me. I rest my hands on his shoulders and he puts his on my sides. “It’s a little weird, huh?” he says.
“Yeah,” I confess.
He looks around the room. “I like the changes you’ve made.”
I did some renovations after Kelsey moved out. New paint colors, window treatments, updated kitchen appliances and bathroom fixtures. A bold print wallpaper in my bedroom, and some new furniture. Including…
“New bed,” I tell Victor, shuffling a little closer to him, in between his spread knees.
I slide my hands from his shoulders up the column of his neck and tangle my fingers in his hair.
He pulls me even closer, wraps his arms around my waist, and rests his forehead against me.
“I mean, not that new, but no one but me has slept in it.”
“Is sleeping what you want to do right now?” Victor asks, his voice muffled in my shirt.
“No,” I tell him. I pull his hair hard enough to lift his head and force him to look at me. “I want to suck you off, then fuck you. Is that okay with you?”
“Yeah,” he says on a shaky breath.
I step back and kneel down. I start with his shoes, untying the laces and pulling them off his feet, then his socks. When I kneel up to work his jeans off, Victor has already unbuttoned them and is fumbling with his zipper.
“No,” I say. His eyes meet mine, startled. “I meant…I’d like you to be still and let me…” Do all the work, I almost said, but this is the farthest thing from work. Please you, is closer to what I mean but still not right.
Worship you is too blasphemous.
Love you is what I really mean but I’m too afraid to say it out loud.
“Can you?” I ask instead. “Be still for me?”
“Of course,” Victor says.
It’s the inverse of what happened that first night. I’m still taking charge. I’m still taking what I want. But I’m asking him first.
I pull his zipper down slowly and delight in how his cock swells into the gap. Victor braces his hands behind him on the bed as I bend my head and exhale a hot stream of breath through the fabric of his underwear. When I lift my head, there’s a wet spot that I don’t think is only from my mouth.
I hook my fingers in his jeans and underwear and pull them down.
He cooperates by lifting his hips just enough that I can get them over his ass but is otherwise loose and compliant.
I strip him of his sweater and the T-shirt underneath, because I like to look at him naked, but don’t bother removing my own clothes yet.
I’m back to kneeling between his spread thighs and regard his cock before me. It’s stiff and juts straight up from a dark gold thatch of hair. I feel like I didn’t take time to properly appreciate it during our week in Costa Rica.
Or maybe I’ve just missed it.
And him.
I close my eyes and inhale the musky, warm scent of him. Then I take my time exploring and enjoying him. I lick a broad swath up from the base to his tip, then engulf the tip between my lips. Victor sighs and drops down on his elbows.
I suck and lick and nibble and generally make a mess of things between my spit and the fluid leaking from Victor’s cock.
Victor pants and moans and his fists clench at his sides.
I hoist his thighs over my shoulders to lift him enough that, when I pull off long enough to stick my finger in my mouth to wet it, I can feel between his cheeks for that tight furled spot.
Accompanied by a steady, sucking rhythm and one hand curled tightly around the length of him that doesn’t fit in my mouth, I press and release at his entrance.
Each time I press forward, he opens a little more for me.
When I look up at his face, he’s biting his lip like he’s trying to hold something back.
I pull off and say, “You can talk if you want. You’re being very good, being so still for me.”
His cheeks flush pink. I don’t know why watching him squirm a little when I praise him is so hot.
His mouth opens and closes but he doesn’t say anything. I go back to sucking him and pressing my finger inside him, this time all the way in on one smooth glide.
Victor arches his back and groans. Then his hips settle on the mattress. “Sorry,” I hear him whisper. My lips curve around his cock. I’m not going to chastise him for that. It’s still too much a marvel to me that I can unravel him like this.
From the sounds he’s making and the aborted little hitches of his hips that I think he’s not even aware of, I’m guessing he’s close. I slide my finger out and press two inside him, opening him slowly while I suck him deeper into my mouth.
“Jesus, Jay,” he swears.
When my fingers brush his prostate, his hips jolt. A couple more sucks and that’s it. He comes down my throat with a long moan and I swallow as much as I can.
When he’s finished, I pull off and out of him and settle back on my heels. My knees are killing me but it was worth it. Victor looks delightfully debauched, sprawled on my bed, and my own cock is rigid and desperate.
I strip off my suit, tie, shirt, and undershirt. Part of me wants to maintain the power differential of fucking him fully clothed while he’s naked, but the more practical part of me shudders at the thought of my dry-cleaning bill.
Besides, there’s a lot to be said for the feel of his bare skin against mine.