Chapter Six #3
he'd had other things on his mind, but he hadn't meant for one
second to let Sasha think any of it was to do with him. “I just
mean—”
The
inner doors swung open. Between them, propping them stiffly on each
arm, Laurie's new backstage manager stood framed, his little
clipboard swinging on a cord from round his neck. “Mr Fitzroy! I've
searched the building for you.” He spared one glance at Sasha then
dismissed him. “I'm afraid that, under the terms of your contract,
your break times must be set by Sir Ralf and are not to
exceed—”
“Right.” Laurie straightened his shirt. Hardworking pro or not,
he needed more time. Helplessly he thought of how Alison Jones
would have swung it for him, given him a conspiratorial wink and
run off to implement delaying tactics. “Sorry, er... Bill, isn't
it?”
“Neil.”
“Oh. I'm on my way.”
“You'd better come with me. Regulations state that backstage
management is responsible for the whereabouts and safety of staff
at all times. You may have been used to a less formal system, Mr
Fitzroy, but...”
“Just a minute.”
Both
Neil and Laurie swung round. Sasha was standing with his arms
folded, his expression at once mild and subtly dangerous in a way
Laurie hadn't seen before. If a Roma warlord had been crossed with
Clement Atlee... “Sasha,” Laurie said, a quiver of amusement in his
voice. “It's okay.”
“As I understand it, Neil, Mr Fitzroy's contractual terms have
not yet been agreed. Until they are, he stands entitled to such
time as he requires to deal with personal and family emergencies,
under working-time regulation six-five-eight, paragraph three. Are
you attempting to deny him that right?”
Neil did
an impression of a startled goldfish. “Deny? No. Of course not. I'm
just...”
“Please don't say following my
orders, or I'll be forced to give you a
history lesson. Now, off you trot, and Mr Fitzroy will be back with
Sir Ralf in five minutes.”
The
double doors closed. Laurie leaned back against the wall, horrified
laughter shaking him. “Oh, my God.”
“Poxy little jobsworth,” Sasha said carefully, savouring as
always his second language's rich store of insults. “Rip his little
clipboard off and make him call you Sir Laurence.”
“Regulation six-five-eight... I never knew I had one of
those.”
“You don't. I invented it, so don't rely on it in court.”
Sliding his fingers inside the waistband of Laurie's jeans, Sasha
smiled up at him, stern gaze turned suddenly wicked as hell through
dark eyelashes. “Having got rid of him, shall we make good use of
our five minutes?”
Laurie's
jaw dropped. “What?”
“You said you needed to focus. I can help with
that.”
“Sasha Petrica... You're the devil incarnate under that velvety
hide, aren't you?”
“Hush. Live in the moment, ves'tacha. Just think about the job
in hand.”
Laurie
swallowed and breathed shallowly. Sasha was folding to his knees on
the concrete. “The job in where?” Laurie rasped. “This is meant to
help me concentrate on Romeo?”
“Mm-hm. Mindfulness, it's called. You think about nothing but
the instant you're experiencing right now. It's an effective
technique for—”
“Oh. You saw your new counsellor.”
Sasha
looked up at him. Laurie's fingertips were resting lightly on his
jaw. The London afternoon was continuing its symphony of sound
beyond the fire doors—cars rushing by, the scrape of feet on
pavement. And here they were in this featureless box, empty of
everything but their own two lives and the web they'd spun between
them. Laurie was smiling, a brightness of relief putting summer-sea
blue into his eyes. “Yes,” Sasha said. It was the first serious lie
he'd told him in two years. It didn't matter. He could disappear
somewhere for a couple of hours each week. He'd read about
mindfulness in a waiting-room magazine, but that was no problem.
Now Laurie might breathe again, enjoy his new job.
“Yes.”
“Oh, that's great. Is he kind? Is he good to you?”
“Yes.” One lie spawned others instantly, didn't it? No
gestation time required. “Very good.” Sasha released Laurie's cock
from its imprisoning fabric and immediately recaptured it, guiding
it into his mouth, deep into his throat where it could push the
lies back where they came from, stopper them up, drown them. He
gripped Laurie's backside, squeezed and encouraged his shuddering
thrusts for a moment then slipped a hand down the back of his
jeans. There was the delicious, sweat-damped hollow where his
tailbone curved in. Desperately sensitive there for some reason,
his Laurie. From there to the crease between his buttocks, and the
upper curve of his anus, where a sudden caress or pressure could
make him forget his manners and...
“Oh, Sasha! God! No!”
Sasha
held on tight. He forgot about truth and lies, achieved a state of
mindfulness more perfect than any he'd been trying to sell to
Laurie. He was nothing but convulsing throat, hot hard muscle
clenched round his lover and making him come. Laurie jetted and
spent, finishing with a groan of wrung-out shock as Sasha's finger
coaxed a last rush from him.
Excitement vortexed downward between Sasha's hips. He hadn't
meant to involve himself at all—could give a daytime blow job
without the least need for a return. But that was a reflex from a
bad old time, and Laurie knew all about it. Laurie, still gasping,
grabbed him by the armpits and raised him up. Planted him against
the wall and, before Sasha could draw breath to stop him, knelt in
his turn.
Sasha
hung on for barely a minute. He pushed one hand into Laurie's hair
and scraped the other palm against the breezeblocks, seeking
control in the pain. He had no other grip. Laurie knew his body
too, its trigger points and sweet spots. And even when he hadn't—on
that very first night in the attic bedroom—the sight of that dark
head bowing over him, that sculptured mouth with all its restless
brilliance silenced, opening up to take him in... No, Sasha had
never learned self-restraint when his lover did this to him, and he
went over silently, arching his spine in an anguish of surrender.
He'd flare in tiger colours if his pleasure could be seen. The
concrete box would glow, break down and melt into the
earth...
His
knees gave. Laurie caught him neatly. Actor and dreamer, he was
still practical enough to know what a come stain would do to
Sasha's business suit, his plans for the afternoon, and he propped
him, laughing. “Hang on. Got a handkerchief somewhere. Let me mop
you up.”
“You're a gentleman. You?”
“Don't worry about me. A mark or two will just enhance my
reputation. I'm not called Romeo for nothing.”
They clung together, breathing hard. When the dim-lit room had
stopped spinning around him, Sasha looked up, placing a hand on
Laurie's cheek. “I do worry, though. Will you be okay now?”
“Never better. Oh, Sash, it was good of you to...”
“Drop everything and come, so to speak?”
“Mm.” Laurie chuckled. He rubbed his brow against Sasha's. “And
to deal with that little twerp Bill.”
“Neil,” Sasha reminded him. “You want
to watch out for that one. He'll be checking up on that
working-time regulation right now. And don't tell Arnie I managed
you, for God's sake—he'll have me murdered in my bed.”
Laurie
flinched. “I might have let Arnie go.”
“What? When?”
“Just this morning. He was here when I turned up, trying to
bully Sir Ralf into giving me my own trailer and blue-eyed white
tigers to stroke between takes.”
“Wow. Okay. Look, you need to get going, and we'll talk more
tonight, but... this wasn't anything to do with me, was
it?”
“No. No, not at all.” Laurie smoothed his own hair, then
reached to brush invisible disorder from Sasha's short, velvety
crop. “But if you think about it—why should I employ somebody who has a
problem with us? With you?”
“No reason. But I've dealt with bigger things than Arnie
Hamlin, you know. I can handle him, if you want to change your
mind.”
“No. Why would I?”
“His politics don't bear examination. But he was looking out
for your interests, and I like that in a man.”
“He looked out for them because they matched his
own.”
“Some cynical people would say...”
“That's the essence of management. Okay, okay. But it's done
now.”
“All right.” Sasha looked into his face. His pupils were
dilated, more Romeo than Laurie here with him now in the little
room, but his energies were running smoothly again. Sasha was glad
of it. Not since Sir William had beaten him half to death and he'd
crawled for refuge into Mama Luna's encampment had Sasha seen him
so lost. “Go on, then. Go lure your little bird off her
balcony.”
“I think I fancy Mercutio more.”
“You can make that clear in your theatrical subtext. I'll be
late home tonight, so get yourself some supper, and... call me if
you need me, all right? Any time.”
“You mean that, don't you?”
“Of course.”
“God. I love you.”