6. One Hundred Percent Positive Reinforcement #2
They were close to the bed, and he clutched Connor’s shoulders, because he did not want to be dropped, not even onto what online reviews claimed was an excellent mattress.
Connor bent and set Jonathan’s head on the pillow like he was a cursed princess, but then ruined the effect by bouncing into the space next to him and hip-checking Jonathan until he wiggled sideways to create more room.
“This bed is so fucking comfortable.” Connor spread his arms wide and gathered Jonathan into his side like a toy. “Why were we in the entry instead of here?”
“Someone had a door man fantasy?” Finding words again set Jonathan more at ease, enough so that he settled his hand on Connor’s stomach.
He didn’t have a choice, given how Connor had pulled him into his side; he could leave his hand awkwardly hovering in the air or set it on Connor’s body, those were the only two options.
He knew, in his gray-matter brain, that Connor had stretched himself out on the bed and that’s why his abs and stomach were picturesquely taut and leading to interesting places, and if he was slouching in a chair, he wouldn’t look quite as much like a classical statue, albeit with a bigger cock.
However, right here at this moment Connor was extremely touchable.
Extremely fuckable.
And, based upon his earlier sex-drunk exclamations, it seemed this big man would be very happy to have Jonathan do that as soon as they recovered.
Connor slipped his free arm behind his head, deliberately popping his chest muscles and displaying his underarm definition for petting, if Jonathan had to guess. “Do I have glitter on me?”
“Hard to tell.” He dusted his fingers through the thatch around Connor’s navel. They should have skipped dessert and come here earlier, because the night wasn’t going to be long enough for all the ways he wanted to enjoy Connor.
“You’ll have to keep trying, then.”
Jonathan glanced at Connor’s face. “What else are you up for?”
“Blow jobs?”
The famous Ribby probably made eyes like that when he wanted a snack. “I love blow jobs, but I don’t particularly like to put my mouth on a stranger’s cock, and I hate the taste of latex.”
“Fair.”
Jonathan was not an expert, but he assumed those were sad puppy eyes.
“Just so you know, I don’t have that same boundary. And I also brought my favorite vanilla condoms. For me, I mean. I respect your choices, the condoms would be for your cock but my mouth, that’s what I mean.”
“I believe I understood.” Getting without reciprocation had also not been Jonathan’s usual experience.
“What else?”
He looked at his own thigh nestled next to Connor’s.
They were both men; neither leg looked feminine, but Connor’s was covered with that thick blond hair and Jonathan had so little leg hair that whether he removed it or not barely mattered.
Connor’s calves were tanned, but the natural skin tone of the top of his thighs was a glowing peachy cream that broadcast almost cartoon-like whiteness.
Jonathan didn’t like tan lines, certainly not close to his knees, and generally wore long pants or short shorts to prevent them.
“You used the word versatile at dinner.”
“Did I?”
“And you definitely mentioned something else you wanted while we were at the door.”
“What was that? You’re going to have to repeat it.”
Jonathan lifted himself on one elbow to glare down at Connor. “I’m absolutely interested in your ass.”
“Already?” He grinned.
He couldn’t stop his eyes from rolling. “No, not already.”
“Well, why not?”
“Are you a…” Jonathan almost said toddler, because the series of questions reminded him of story time attendees, but ick, no. Rephrase. “Why? Are you in a hurry?”
“For your cock to take charge of my ass? Heck, yes.”
“Ugh.” He threw himself back on the pillow. It had been a complete pillow minutes ago, but now it had shrunk to only three-quarters of a pillow, because Connor had spread into his space. He rolled slightly, but the room’s air conditioning unit blew directly on his shoulders and spine.
“Please move, I would like a blanket.”
“A blanket blanket”—Connor gestured to the foot of the bed—“or a meat blanket?” He flopped a heavy arm and leg across Jonathan’s body.
“I beg your pardon?”
Connor was stifling laughter. Jonathan wanted to call it mirth, but he wasn’t that much of a pretentious asshole, despite the phrase that had just exited his mouth.
“Your face,” Connor said.
“No, your face.” Somehow this man made him sound like a fourth-grader. So, the older person in the room.
Then Connor bounded off the bed and tossed the white duvet over Jonathan. “I’ll be right back, don’t go.”
He was already in the bathroom by the time Jonathan said, “It’s my room.”
“Right, I forgot.”
Jonathan heard water running. Connor drank loudly. Water ran again. Then he returned wearing a towel wrapped around his waist and carrying a glass for Jonathan and a damp washcloth.
“You don’t have to ask. It’s a different glass.”
The water was nice, and he swapped the empty glass for the warm, damp cloth.
“You missed some before. I thought it might be bugging you.”
It had been, but he hadn’t thought Connor, a man who used a phrase like meat blanket and didn’t look away politely while Jonathan wiped dried smears from his inner thighs, would have noticed.
As soon as he finished, Connor twitched the cloth from his fingers and bent to press his lips to the skin below Jonathan’s navel. “Better?”
Now he felt squirmy for a reason he couldn’t identify, or more accurately didn’t want to identify, so he snapped. “It was not a boo-boo.”
“Oops, sorry.”
And he disappeared into the bathroom again, and again with the water sounds. Rummaging around sounds. What the fuck was Connor doing in there?
“Hey, we use the same cleanser!” Connor sounded ridiculously excited from the other room.
“Are you going through my things?” He couldn’t possibly; it must be a mistake.
“Yep. Wow, you have a lot of products.”
He tensed, remembering the muddle of bottles and jars he’d crowded in the corner of the vanity after he’d rushed to get ready for dinner.
When he’d still been skating and sharing rooms with his mother before competitions, she’d warned against letting other people see his silly products.
She’d told him to hide everything back in a suitcase, because that much excessive crap would make people think he was messy and undisciplined.
Too messy to clean up after himself and too undisciplined to win, she’d said.
Now Connor had seen it, all of it.
Jonathan felt colder. He tugged the duvet tighter across his shoulders and tried to sink into the pillow, even though it wouldn’t make him warmer and couldn’t hide him.
“Is this good? Does it work?” Connor came around the corner holding Jonathan’s tube of Jo Malone lime, basil and mandarin lotion.
It had not been a bargain purchase.
“I’ve been thinking I need to do something for my elbows, especially now that it’s summer.”
Jonathan took a deep breath and looked at Connor, the only other person actually in the room, or at least the only person Jonathan wanted in the room.
He stood in a way that twisted his torso three-quarters toward the bed, like one of the statues at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and lifted his arm, pointing his elbow at Jonathan but at the same time twisting to show the arena-sized span of muscles popping over his ribs and chest. Precisely which muscles, Jonathan had no idea, because despite years of skating competitions and the workout schedules involved with being fit enough to rotate multiple times in the air, he’d never bothered to learn the specific names for the places on his body that popped when he lifted his arms.
Well, after several years of school, his own didn’t precisely pop anymore as much as blink, but Connor’s various muscles appeared and took their bows quite regularly.
“You like it? The lotion?”
Did the man know what he was doing?
“Jonathan?” That was a smirk. “I asked if you liked it.”
He knew, he absolutely knew, and he must be deliberately screwing with Jonathan. Game on. “A bit more than I expected to, actually.”
Connor tilted his head and smirked, as if acknowledging the hit. “Only a bit?”
Jonathan shrugged and looked at the ceiling rather than stare too long at that towel-wrapped golden gummy bear.
“So can I try it?”
“Now?”
Connor flipped open the lid. “No time like the present.”
“No?”
And that didn’t matter because he squeezed a large dab, not a dime but more like a quarter, onto his fingers and then lifted the opposite arm and started rubbing Jonathan’s moisturizer in circles. Thank fuck he’d buried his body in sheets and blankets.
“My no was what, inaudible? Irrelevant? Immaterial?”
“One thing I’ve learned from having a dog.”
“Only one? Do tell.” He partially raised himself on one elbow.
“Say no like you mean it, Jonathan. Rising intonation makes whatever you say meaningless.”
“Hand me that magazine from the table and I’ll tell you no like I mean it.”
Connor spread a hand in the valley between those pecs, which was a muscle Jonathan could name. “There is no corporal punishment in my home. It’s one hundred percent positive reinforcement.”
The way he spun on his heel sent the edge of the towel flaring and revealed the side of one of those big thighs for a moment.
Jonathan might have glimpsed the curve at the top, but far too soon the towel settled in place.
For once, though, Connor did not return to the bathroom but stood with his bubble butt facing the bed. And waited.
“Only positive reinforcement? Too bad.” Jonathan sighed heavily. “Some things would be a very pretty pink after a spanking.”
That earned a gasp from Connor, and a shiver down his spine, but then he fled to the bathroom.
It wasn’t three minutes, probably not even two, before he popped back into the bedroom. Jonathan was exhausted without even leaving the bed.
“Can I use your toothbrush?”
“No.”
“There!” Connor beamed at him. “You definitely meant that! I’ll find the toothpaste and use my finger then, I can adapt.”