Chapter Two #3
fencing classes, stunt training, unarmed combat. And that fine
skin, rich and delicate as silk... Sasha kissed and bit him lightly
until Laurie spread his thighs and made a sound of tortured
impatience. Straightening up, Sasha called on the last of his
manners—the last trace of the civilised man who’d been
systematically killed off between the theatre and home—to slick
himself thoroughly with lube. Then he pressed the head of his cock
to Laurie’s entrance, waited till the ring of muscle twitched for
him and gave, and pushed in deep.
Laurie
groaned and jerked his head up. He clutched at the edge of the
stair. No warning, none of Sash’s usual sweet care, circling with
his fingers, opening him. His flesh cramped in protest but there
was no pain—only invasion, the overwhelming feel of being filled to
bursting and then a bit more. Terrifying. Just exactly what his
body needed. Ah, God, body and soul—Bertram fled at last, banished
by fiery sword.
He was
coming. Way too soon, trying hopelessly to scrabble back from the
brink. He grunted explosively in protest, but Sasha rescued
him—thrust into him just right, keeping him high until he could
catch up with himself and feel his orgasm as more than just a wild
expulsion from his balls. Pleasure seared up his spine. He gave a
yell that bounced off the corniced ceiling and came back to collide
with Sasha’s. Sasha leaned over him, arms tight round Laurie’s
waist, fusing them together for the convulsion of shared
climax.
They hit
the staircase in a tangle. Sasha withdrew clumsily, gasping an
apology. But Laurie scrambled blindly into his arms, past caring.
“Sweetheart,” Sasha whispered when he had the breath for it,
kissing the crown of Laurie’s head. He held him tight, rocking him.
“Sorry. Bit of a flash-fuck there.”
Laurie
choked and shuddered with laughter. “We needed each other. I... I
needed you.”
What the
hell was that trace of uncertainty in his voice? Sasha dragged him
close. “In what possible universe do you imagine you could ever
need me more than I need you? My beautiful boy... Are you all
right?”
“Yeah. Came so hard I think I pulled something.”
“Oh, God. Nothing we’ll be needing again tonight, I
hope.”
“You’ll be bloody lucky. Help me upstairs before I die of
starvation and sex.”
Sasha
did as he was bidden, half-lifting Laurie to his feet and bundling
him up the stairs, one hand firmly propped against his arse. He was
almost sorry to leave the liminal world of the hallway, even though
it was to enter the glowingly handsome living space he and Laurie
had put together between them. Sasha still had trouble believing he
belonged here. Some part of him was more at ease
outside.
He had
almost died of sex himself. His flesh was reverberant with echoes,
and he was less steady on his feet than Laurie, though better at
hiding it. Were he and Laurie at their best when they met in
passion in the space between street and home—between the two worlds
that had once divided them? He shivered. Pushing the thought from
his mind, he followed Laurie inside.
***
Laurie
sat and watched his lover stretched out on the rack of his dreams.
They had started in the small hours, and Laurie, by prior
agreement, had got out of bed and taken up position in a chair on
the far side of the room.
He
leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He pressed his
fingers to his lips. That way he stood a better chance of keeping
quiet when Sasha’s next low wail of anguish filled the air. Better
still if he didn’t look. He tried closing his eyes, but that was no
good—his imagination promptly filled the gap with worse than what
was there. He turned his attention to the bedroom walls. Not much
to distract him there, though. He and Sash had been so overwhelmed
by the high ceiling and elegant Regency panelling that the posters
and newspaper cuttings they’d cheerfully plastered over their room
in their previous flat had remained in a box beneath the bed. Of
course Laurie knew what a wealthy man’s bedroom might look like—and
they were pretty well off now; by Sasha’s standards absolutely
loaded—and he could have chosen paintings, mirrors, signs of their
new standing. But that was all they would have been. Symbols, a
meaningless surface layer he’d learned from –
“Mira kumpania! Mira kumpania... pahome, san
pahome!”
Help them! My friends, they’re cold. Frozen.
Laurie hadn’t learned much Romani but the vocab of
Sasha’s nightmares was concise. By now Laurie could
understand container
ship, and cold, and dying. He clamped his hands to the
arms of the chair. In their wide bed—one thing he and Sasha had
been able to choose with unhesitating pleasure, grinning at the
showroom assistant and testing the springs—Sasha struggled over
onto his front to silence a howl.
Laurie got up. He knew the words for no, too, and please. Sasha swiped one pillow off
the bed and seized the other. Lean muscles stood up in cords across
his shoulders. He was naked to the waist, his velvety cap of black
hair damping into spikes. Please. No.
No!
Deliberately Laurie unclenched his fists and sat down again.
He would obey his orders, even though a copper taste was filling
his mouth and his stomach was shifting uneasily around his nice
Thai meal, shared cold but ravenously straight out of the boxes on
their kitchen table. He trusted Sasha’s doctor. Don’t disturb him, Laurence. His subconscious has to deal
with it. Let him dream it out.
That was fine for Dr Matthews, who didn’t have to be here
listening. Still, Laurie trusted her—had to, having no ideas of his
own on how to deal with this. You mustn’t
touch him. Definitely don’t wake him up.
Sasha
woke himself with a raw yell. He shoved upright in the bed and
twisted round, arms flailing empty air. “Laurie!”
Laurie
leapt up so hard he knocked the chair over behind him. He shot
across the room—too big, too bloody vacant—and scrambled onto the
bed. He wasn’t good at languages and attempts at Romani sounded
awkward on his tongue but he gave back Sasha’s oldest endearment to
him, hauling the sweat-soaked body into his arms. “Ves’tacha! I’m
here, I’m here.”
“Oh, Laurie... What the fuck...”
“You were dreaming again. Talk to me about it.
Please.”
“No! I mean... I can’t. I don’t remember.”
That was a lie. Laurie, who knew all his sounds of truth, felt
it like a cold blade pressing between them. Clutching him
bruisingly tight, he let it go. The doctor had said that if Sasha
would talk, put the nightmares outside of himself into words, that
would be half the battle. But Laurie was starting to fear they had
only just started this war. For a year they’d lived peacefully,
crushed together in Laurie’s dreadful bedsit overlooking the
Birchwood railway lines. Something to do with moving here had
triggered the bad dreams. They’d been an occasional trouble at
first, then had begun to invade Sasha’s sleep almost every night,
worsening until Laurie had sidestepped their ineffectual GP and
taken Sash to one of the doctors his mother saw. Dr Matthews had
been gentle with poor disoriented Marielle, and was sensible and
kind with Sasha too. Remember he’s been a
refugee. You can’t change his past. Just give him a safe place
now.
Well,
Laurie had. He fought against baffled rage. What did he have to do,
to look after his lover and his home? He’d worked because he adored
his career but also because each new role meant a better, safer
world for Sash. For Clara too, when she was with them. He sat on
the bed, watching the restless wash of leaf-shadow on the bare
wall. A summer wind was blowing in the city streets tonight. The
sound of it blended with Sasha’s ragged breathing. He was becoming
limp and heavy in Laurie’s arms, dropping back into sleep with his
secrets and stories untold.
Laurie
eased him down onto the mattress. He stretched out beside him and
lay wide-eyed. Sasha even smelled different after these horrific
dreams, a tang of fear overlaying the warm, contented musk that
wrapped them both round after sex. They’d gone for it again after
their shared meal and a bath, putting Sinbad aside in favour of a
slow, sweet fuck...
Slow
enough and deep enough, Laurie had thought, to tip Sasha over into
unassailable peace. Laurie had taken his time, the desperate edge
worn off him by their tussle on the stairs. He’d knelt between
Sasha’s thighs and thrust into him until Sash had been lost in it,
writhing, clutching the bars of the headboard. They’d stared into
one another’s eyes for every stroke, and Laurie could have sworn he
was looking through star-filled galactic distances to the core of
Sasha’s soul.
But
nothing was certain. He held Sasha close. The wind continued to
lash the shadows on the wall, and after half an hour, the
nightmares started again.