CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
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THIS PLACE WAS both tomb and junk pile. In one hand, Raj held a crown fit for Cleopatra, in the other a polyester pizza costume. Neither was a good fit for him.
“How are you getting on?” Adam called from somewhere deep in the maze.
“Ah…” Raj stuffed the pizza costume back into the stack of food outfits. “Why?”
“Just making certain that the phantom of the theater hasn’t absconded with you.” Adam’s voice managed to bound about the room.
In chasing the sound, Raj spotted an old pirate hat with a long red feather. After steadying it on his head, he called out, “What would you do to save me?”
“Save you?”
Raj damn near yelped at the sudden outburst just behind him.
He spun on his heels, his heart pounding from fright, until he took in the silhouette before him.
A cloak blacker than midnight hung from cocksure shoulders.
A top hat to match perched on the edge of his head.
But the pièce de résistance was the bone white mask clinging to half of his face.
He had one finger to his exposed lips, his face in profile to hide most of the mask.
Then, with a dramatic turn, he focused those steel razor eyes on Raj, and his spine melted.
“My boy, I’m the one doing the stealing.
” The phantom gave a pleased-with-himself laugh that nearly tipped into a cackle before he coughed it off.
“Wow.” Raj gulped. A whole lot of repressed fantasies hit him at once.
The dashing gentleman eyeing him up across a crowded room.
The mysterious masked man who seemed to be only interested in him.
And traveling on a boat through a candle-filled sewer to get railed by the mysterious phantom while he whispered-sang every moan.
It took a minute for Raj to form any word other than “Uh.” To be fair, a lot of his blood was busy elsewhere. “You… Are you going to sing?”
Adam laughed, tossed back his head, and took a deep breath. “No,” he said, causing Raj to chuckle. “So, what do you think?” Even in the tight quarters, he gave a little spin. The cape rose off the floor, colliding with Raj’s knees that were about to give out.
I want to tear it off of you!
No, wrong thing to say and not even true. He wanted to leave it on—nearly all of it on. To take that phantom’s cock while staring through the mask’s eye hole and feel every moan against his lips—that’s what Raj really wanted.
Again, too bad about the blood issue.
“It’s good,” stumbled out of him.
Adam threw his shoulders back, causing the cape to slip behind him. “There’s nothing I love more than a dramatic cloak.” He’d abandoned his suit jacket somewhere and had placed a small red rose into his shirt’s breast pocket. While slipping it free, Adam approached Raj.
“So, tell me…my handsome bird.” Adam glided his palm over Raj’s hip.
Just as Adam’s fingers were digging in, pulling Raj closer to him, Adam brushed the petals of the velvet rose against Raj’s lips.
A tingle on the edge of a tickle zapped across them.
He nearly pressed them together when Adam was there, staring. Watching.
Overpowering.
“Do you want to sing?”
Fuck!
Adam cupped Raj’s cock ramming into his jeans. He loomed closer, the white of the mask bleaching one side of his face until it glowed. The other hid in the shadows. Only his eye gleamed through the dark.
Taking his damn time, Adam dotted the tips of his fingers—one by one—down Raj’s straining cock and the denim prison. Just as he reached the balls, Adam asked, “Well?” He cupped his hand under Raj’s sac, his eyes daring him to say no and see what happened next.
Raj’s body lifted onto his toes as if to either escape the threat or give him better access. A part of him wanted to challenge the phantom, to see how far he could push that legendary wrath. But as Adam twisted his fingers around the outer edge of Raj’s cock, his spine snapped.
“Yes!” he cried out and kissed Adam. Cold porcelain pressed into Raj’s cheek, but the hard edge digging into his skin only heated his desires.
Parting his lips, Raj sought for Adam’s tongue.
More than that, he chased that hot, rage-filled kiss from the basement.
The one stewing with so much steam it boiled away all of his failsafes until he’d nearly blown the man while they’d drowned.
Raj was so focused on kissing Adam, he missed the little zip, but the cold hand of death clutching his bare cock cut him to the bone.
His mouth parted, his gasp spreading Adam’s lips as a chill ran up his spine.
The coolness of Adam’s palm tugging on the pliant skin of Raj’s shaft only added to the ambiance.
He’d swear he could smell the candle wicks, hear the horse…
Who brings a horse into a sewer?
“Yes!” Raj cried out as Adam swept his pinkie right up the divide in the crown.
“My little bird is singing. But that’s only one note.” Adam dropped his thumb to Raj’s chin, then he pressed each finger into Raj’s cheek. Tightening his grip, he zeroed in on Raj’s eyes, then pumped his fist faster. “I want an aria.”
“Oh…” Raj wrapped both his hands around Adam’s forearm. Not to pull him off, but to keep him right where he was. His eyes slipped closed, and he couldn’t stop thrusting his hips, chasing the thrill strumming through his blood. “Please, touch me. Take me. Do whatever you want!”
Even as Adam teased Raj’s crown, he nibbled his way across Raj’s cheek, then licked around his ear. “Be careful what you offer, little bird.”
Adam clamped his hand at the base of Raj’s cock, nearly causing tears to spring up in shock. “Your phantom gives as much as he takes.”
Blinking through the shadows, Raj focused on Adam under the mask. The man wore a wry little smile as he stood back. Still, he held Raj by his cock, nearly pulling him to his doom.
It’d be a good one, though. Even in the midst of torturing him, Adam kept drawing his finger up and down the throbbing vein until Raj feared he might burst.
“Sing,” Adam commanded, placing a hand to Raj’s chest. Then that mask, glowing like a half moon in the night, began to descend. “Sing!” The phantom landed on his knees, his fingers bundling up the hem of Raj’s sweater.
Raj’s first instinct was to tousle his lover’s hair, but the hat was in the way. It blocked nearly everything other than a flash of the white mask and Adam’s nose as he tugged Raj’s cock into place.
Hot breath caressed over the throbbing skin, followed by the softest touch of velvet. Shocked, Raj looked down to find Adam drawing the rose over his pulsing cock. He nearly laughed when a wet tongue slicked over his crown.
Any semblance of control vanished in a second.
Raj panted for air, guzzling too much in until his tongue and lips sparkled.
Adam lapped his tongue in a circle, traversing up and down the first half of Raj’s cock while that rose kept tickling the rest. The dual sensations of pressing, wet heat, and delicate, velvet caresses drove him mad.
He tried to think of a song from the musical, a pop song, a god damn jingle—but his mind was blank. All he knew was that hot tongue corkscrewing his cock. Then the flower moved. The phantom brushed it right down the middle of Raj’s sac until the velvet petals caressed his taint.
“Oh, damn,” he moaned. A thousand dormant nerves fired from his balls to his ass. He held his breath, waiting for the phantom to slip the flower up his asscrack, then add a finger. The anticipation had distracted him so that Raj missed Adam’s jaw opening and devouring him.
Incoherent words fell from Raj’s lips. Any attempt at singing or talking vanished as his cock rammed down the hot throat of the masked man.
Every tug of Raj’s skin as he clipped against Adam’s teeth only ramped up his adrenaline.
His crown pounded against the roof of Adam’s mouth, then kept going. The man took him all and then some.
Then Adam’s hand tightened on Raj’s sweater and pulled him even deeper.
Unable to take it, Raj grabbed Adam’s top hat. The heat pounding through him stretched to his toes and into his heart. Tipping his head back, he cried out as he started to face fuck the phantom of the theater.
“Yes! Yes!” Over the wet slapping of flesh, the muffled moans of Adam, and the rattling of hangers, Raj could hear the drip of the sewers and the distant opera.
He smelled musty cologne, old parchment, and oil lamps.
The cloak brushing against his legs, the mask digging into his pelvis, the brush of the top hat clenched in his hands dragged him down into his secret fantasy.
“Take me, phantom!” He cried out, a whimper rising as he realized the end was coming fast. The rose brushed up Raj’s taint, and Adam swallowed him to the hilt until his nose burrowed into Raj’s soft padding. “I-I-I!”
Despite all of his best efforts, there was no stopping this climax.
Latching onto the back of the hat, Raj pulled Adam close and gave in.
Every millimeter of his cock shivered as a gallon of cum pumped down Adam’s throat.
His muscles tightened until Raj was as rigid as a board.
The pleasure seeped up his chest and took hold of his brain.
Sighing, Raj nearly collapsed on top of Adam, who had enough sense to reach up and catch him. “I’m yours,” Raj whispered, his eyes too heavy to look up.
All he knew was a chest pressing to his, hands brushing back his hair, and a hard cock begging for relief against his stomach. God, he ached to touch Adam, but as he lifted his hand, his arm gave out.
“I think you sucked the life out of me,” Raj said, trying again.
Adam laughed, his eyes a black and white fire under the mask. “I did warn you.”
Taking Adam’s chin, Raj gazed into his beautiful face. “Worth it,” he whispered before kissing him.
This time, he heard the zipper and was surprised to find Adam had tucked him away. He nearly reached for Adam’s cock, but the man stepped back. With care, he pulled off his hat, then the mask. While gazing into the empty eye, he said, “I admit, this is not how I expected our night to go.”
“It’s still young,” Raj argued. Even if his balls were empty, they ached to tease Adam, to see him naked, to watch his cocksure face crumble with an orgasm.
“You might want to check your phone,” Adam said.
Confused, Raj fished into his pants instead of Adam’s. Five missed calls. Sixteen texts! As he checked his voicemail, Raj asked, “How did I miss those?”
“It beeped and jangled while I was sucking you off.” He gave a pleased little snort, then finished hanging up his cloak.
Raj sneered to himself as he heard Logan’s pleas for him to return. “It’s my partner. Business partner,” Raj insisted, causing Adam to laugh. “Sounds like something’s gone wrong with the boiler. Great. I…I need to get back to the hotel.”
“Allow me to guide your way to freedom.” Adam held out his arm, and Raj took it.
Like he’d been born in this maze, Adam led both of them out of the theater.
The roads of Anoka had calmed to little more than a vehicle zooming past on the interstate.
All was quiet, especially in the chilled parking lot.
“Your car is that way, I believe.” Adam pointed toward a ring of lights that was probably Main Street.
“What about you?” Raj asked.
“I’m afraid I parked over there. It’s a free lot.”
“No, I mean…” He bit his lip, his stomach churning at the unfair encounter. It’d be one thing if this were just a random one-off meeting, but he liked Adam. He wanted to fuck him.
Adam laughed. “How does Thursday night sound? We could do dinner.”
“Then, I do you?” Raj asked.
It had to be his imagination, but he’d swear Adam’s face fell for a second. But what man doesn’t want a free blowjob? It was the strange light.
Adam swept closer. He took both of Raj’s hands in his. “Sounds heavenly,” he whispered before kissing him. Just as it started to turn hot, with Adam teasing his tongue across Raj’s parted lips, he slipped away.
Raj collapsed his fingers and found that velvet rose clutched between them. Rolling the petals across his palm sent a pulse of hunger through his exhausted cock.
“Until Thursday, my little bird,” Adam called out, his form fading into the shadows.
Do you want to have children?
Please tell me you don’t, because I think I might be falling harder for you than I should.
Raj opened his mouth, about to ask him, before he chickened out. “I await your kidnapping,” he said instead, getting a laugh from his phantom.
The progeny question could wait for date two, or fifteen, or a hundred. No reason to crush this rose just as it was starting to bloom.
His pocket jerked, and he groaned. For as tempting as this fantasy was, real life awaited him.