Chapter 13 #2
Later in the day, he found DJ at the pool, which had become his preferred spot when he was not in the cottage.
DJ was on the unicorn float, but fully clothed in T-shirt and jeans.
He wore his sunglasses, the fedora tipped low on his brow as he floated around on the chlorinated water.
When DJ was near the side, Roy pulled up a chair, leaned down and brought the float to him, putting his foot on it beside DJ’s arm.
The toe of his polished shoe tucked under the kid’s ribs to keep him there.
DJ’s head turned in his direction. The thin line of his mouth and set of his chin confirmed he wasn’t in a good mood.
“I have something I have to do,” Roy told him. “I’ve arranged for us to have a road trip. We’ll leave in the morning. You’ll need to shower, shave and brush your teeth. Return to basic hygiene standards.”
“If I don’t?”
Roy bit back a grim smile at the expected attitude. “Despite that website you mentioned, washing your ass isn’t in my job description.”
DJ’s lips twisted. “What do you have to do that requires me to be clean?”
“You’re going to meet my mom. It’s her birthday.”
DJ removed the glasses. Roy managed to keep his expression neutral, but the disinterest in food was showing more starkly in his face. DJ didn’t have a lot of fat stores to draw upon.
“Did you get her a gift?” DJ asked.
“Last month. A Jeff Foxworthy show at Harrah’s in Cherokee. She took her two best friends to see it.”
“Not her son?”
“Her son was too busy watching your narrow ass.”
DJ considered him. “Plus, you don’t like sitting with your back to anyone. Makes you itchy.”
“I do hate feeling itchy.”
DJ’s lips pursed. “I’ll pick her up a gift on the way.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“If it’s her birthday, I’m bringing her a gift. I’d bring her one even if it wasn’t her birthday. That’s what you do when you meet a mother. Anyone’s mother.”
“So we’ll pick her up some flowers.”
DJ rolled his eyes. “Unimaginative. Are you sure you’re gay? What does she like to do? Does she even like flowers?”
“I’m ignoring your insensitive stereotyping. She likes to work in her yard.”
“Gardening? Or mowing?”
“Gardening. I pay for a landscaper to mow, edge and weed eat for her. It leaves her free for the fun stuff. That was her birthday gift about eight years ago. She fought me on it tooth and nail, and now she acts like it was her own idea.”
DJ’s lips quirked. “So we stop at a garden shop and get her something. One of those suncatchers or something.”
“Okay.” Roy pushed the raft forward and back. DJ had looped his arm around his leg. “Anywhere else you want to go?” Roy asked casually. “Since Moss cleared your calendar, we can go anywhere.”
DJ put the glasses back on and laid his head back. “Nowhere comes to mind.”
“Take the glasses off, Dory. I want to see your eyes.”
When DJ shot him a fuck you look, Roy let his gaze slide to the pool. “Easy enough to dump you and take care of that bath right now.”
DJ sneered, but tossed the glasses onto the concrete. Roy leaned forward, keeping his anchoring foot in place. “You need to eat, man. You look hollowed out.”
“I’ve lost three souls.” DJ’s gaze flicked away from him.
“Dory, look at me. I didn’t say you could look away.”
DJ dragged his gaze back. The belligerence faded away, leaving something painful and portentous.
“Grief is a hurricane, and you’re on a boat with no navigation equipment,” Roy said. “You’re stuck in the worst of it, being cooped up here.”
DJ put his chin down, but as he started to look away, his gaze snapped back. He’d remembered. More importantly, it had mattered to him to remember.
Roy gave him an approving nod. He rose, casually leaned down, and flipped the raft.
As he sauntered away, he grinned at the sputtering as DJ surfaced. He’d reached the conservatory when he heard DJ coming. Roy stopped to watch DJ stride in his direction, with a wet and clingy T-shirt. The weight of the water pulled the jeans low on his hips. Nice view.
“You son of a bitch,” his submissive snarled. “You better run.”
“Not likely.”
Roy ducked the swing, caught his wrist and flipped DJ around so his back was against the narrow stone wall between two of the conservatory’s windows.
He crowded against him, thigh to thigh, chest to chest. As he cradled DJ’s head, he glimpsed angry, surprised eyes before he had his mouth, sealing his lips over it, tongue bringing DJ heat the way his body was.
“I’ll warm you,” he muttered against his lips, and DJ’s body pushed against his.
Not to push him away. Wanting more. Roy kissed him thoroughly, until both their cocks were hard.
He dropped a hand to squeeze DJ’s ass and work him against his own erection.
The kid enjoyed that kind of play, and so did Roy.
“Open the door,” Roy said against his mouth.
DJ complied, taking them into the humid, warm air of the conservatory with its army of plants that needed a protected environment. Like his charge right now.
Roy backed DJ down an aisle of tropical, colorful blooms and into the more private garden shed, lifting him up onto the sturdy potting table with an arm around his waist. DJ’s feet curled around the backs of Roy’s knees as Roy kept kissing him, teeth and tongue demanding control of his mouth.
Roy unbuckled and slid off his belt before he pushed DJ’s arms behind his back and used it to bind his wrists. No hesitation, fast and decisive. The brown eyes got wide, dark and even more needy.
“You know, every time I watch you play the guitar, how you hold it, your speed and dexterity, your focus and intensity…it makes me think of how you look when you masturbate. And how all that dexterity and focus feels when I make you apply it to my cock.”
Roy dipped his head and went after the sensitive nipples, the curve of the pectoral. He bit with the intent to mark.
“What…oh fuck.”
He shoved DJ to his back, arching it over his bound hands as he opened his jeans and freed his cock. Then Roy dropped and put his mouth over it, sucking it deep.
DJ cried out, his bare toes curling, legs jerking as Roy left him no choice, pulling the climax out of him before he could even get his breath.
As he shuddered his way through the aftershocks, Roy gentled the strokes, but kept licking him with teasing passes, listening to the quiet swear words, the heavy breaths. He bit the tip, a gentle admonishment, before he rose to his feet and looked down at his bound submissive.
He put his hand on DJ’s chest, playing in the chest hair, his other hand capturing his depleted and oversensitive cock, enjoying the little quivers.
DJ’s gaze was on him, dazed and hungry still.
Needing what Roy was giving him. Wanting to be immersed in it, because it gave him breathing room from the rest. Roy understood that, even as he knew it was more than that, too.
“This would have happened between us no matter what,” he said. “You understand, Dory?”
He knew how the kid’s mind worked, and his could go along the same lines, but Roy didn’t get confused about things like this. The strength of this had been there, waiting. As if powers bigger than them had known they’d need it. “Tell me you understand, in the way I want to hear it.”
DJ stared up at him. “Yes, Sir. I understand. I want to do something for you.”
“Glad to hear it.” Roy lifted him up and pushed him to his knees on the anti-fatigue mat in front of the table. The mat was printed with the cover art from the Rolling Stones’ Flowers album. He’d bet good money that Lonnie had bought it for DJ, as a thoughtful birthday or Christmas gift.
When he opened up his slacks and gripped his cock, DJ’s pupils dilated. “Serve your Master, DJ. Then clean yourself up so you can meet my mother.”
DJ drew an erratic breath. “Yes, Sir.”
The next morning, Roy got DJ to eat half of a decent breakfast before they hit the road.
They left the property in the back of an HVAC van, ostensibly there to do the semi-annual maintenance on the house system.
Thirty miles away, they transferred to a roomy Suburban.
The driver of the HVAC van, a contract security man Roy trusted, took his leave.
The Suburban with tinted windows and some security upgrades was from Roy’s fleet, but the driver he’d secured was a familiar face for DJ.
Mike had been on a three-month leave due to a new baby, his and his wife’s first, but given the circumstances, his wife agreed to give him a few days on the road.
When DJ had shown pleased surprise but also concern at taking him away from his time with his newborn, Mike waved that away. “Your timing was great. Her mom is visiting, and this way she can take over and be grandma.” He bit his lip. “Sorry, that’s not what I meant, about the timing thing.”
“No, I got it.” DJ looked toward Roy. “I sure hope you’re being paid well for time away from mini-Mike.”
“You’re being very generous,” Roy assured him.
Mike chuckled and they got into the Suburban.
DJ had brought his fedora and glasses. It wasn’t a perfect disguise, but it would work to visit Roy’s mother.
Also for the garden store and nursery tucked in along the winding back road heading out of Asheville.
DJ hadn’t been joking. He insisted on stopping and perusing the outdoor items he could see through the tinted windows.
He quizzed Roy further on his mother’s preferences—green and purple were her favorite colors; she had birdfeeders, and had always wanted a peacock.
How DJ managed to pull that tidbit out of Roy’s brain, he didn’t know.
The kid zeroed in on a bird bath with a peacock standing at the base, his plumage created with green and purple glass.
“What do you think? Would she like that?”
“I think she’d love it.”
“Okay.” DJ pointed at the bird bath. “Mike, go grab that one, and get your wife and mother-in-law something, too. Sheena likes gnomes, right? There’s an army of them here.”