Chapter 7 #5
“Right.” Leo exhaled and glanced at the TV.
He was overly aware of how, in spite of the space now available, he and Joshua were still shoved together on the sofa, their thighs pressed together.
“I just wanted to apologise. Again. You’re a good person, really good, and yeah, there are some things you don’t know, but that’s not really your fault. ”
“I—” Joshua began, and Leo shook his head and sent him a tiny smile.
“No, hey, let me finish. Okay?” He waited for Joshua’s nod before he continued.
“Look, the thing is, I am a bit of a cynical arse at times. And overly defensive when it comes to certain things. And I don’t deal well with feeling vulnerable, so I tend to lash out.
It’s a bit of a reflex at this point, one I’m trying to master.
” Too general, it was all too general; Joshua deserved more than that.
With a sigh, Leo bumped their shoulders together.
“Thing is… I know you don’t mean to, but you do make me feel quite vulnerable.
Which means that you are in the unfortunate position to have enjoyed a taste of me being a dick.
More than once. Definitely much more than you deserve. So, I’m sorry about that.”
Pulling both legs up onto the sofa, Joshua turned to face Leo fully. “I make you feel vulnerable?”
In for a penny, in for a pound. Leo forced himself to hold Joshua’s gaze and responded with a nod. Unease was crawling along his skin, but he ignored it.
His reward came in Joshua shooting him a tiny smile. “Did you mean it?”
“My apology?”
Joshua’s eyes were calm, all his contours mellowed out in the dim flicker from the telly. “When you said that you wanted to kiss me.”
Oh God.
Leo swallowed. “It doesn’t matter. I’m aware you’re out of my league, thank you very much.”
Hurt flashed over Joshua’s face. “That’s stupid, and you know it. It isn’t—you don’t usually treat me like a prince. I thought you didn’t care anymore. That it’s not…”
“It’s not why I’m here tonight,” Leo finished for him. He needed to shut his trap, needed to get out of here before he made a mistake, but—Joshua was so close, and he was just… so lovely. So very, very lovely. All green eyes and pale skin and unfairly red lips.
I always want to kiss you.
“Then why?” Joshua asked softly, and why what? Oh.
“Because you’re my friend,” Leo told him. “That’s why I’m here. Not because you’re a client of ours, or a prince, or some crap like that.”
Another smile flashed over Joshua’s face. Leo wanted to see him smile all the time; he wanted to be the reason for it.
Jesus, Leo was in too deep. Quicksand dragging him under.
When Joshua spoke again, it was with the quiet confusion of someone attempting to solve a riddle.
“We are friends, but I also… I feel like I know so little about you. I don’t even know how old you are.
” He frowned. “I know something happened with your family, and that you miss your sisters, but I don’t know where you grew up.
Whether it was in London, or if you came here to study. Whether you even did study.”
Leo’s skin felt brittle, transparent, his bones hollowed out from the inside.
Sitting up straighter, he was about to get the hell away, already had the right words on the tip of his tongue that would remove him from this situation.
Joshua was watching him with caution etched into the curve of his mouth.
With a measured intake of air, Leo forced the words back down.
Another breath. He loosened his posture and met Joshua’s eyes. It felt as though the room was expanding around them, walls shrinking away like cockroaches that feared the light.
“I’m twenty-seven.” Even this small piece of tangible, concrete truth tasted like sour grapes, foreign and acidic. “Born on the twenty-fourth of December. Wouldn’t recommend it.”
Drawing his knees up to his chest, Joshua folded his hands over them and set his chin on top. His smile was timid. “I take it Baby Jesus stole your thunder?”
I always want to kiss you, Leo’s brain echoed, always, always.
So he reached out to fit his fingers around Joshua’s jaw, leaned in and waited three slow, anxious heartbeats for Joshua to stop him. Instead, Joshua’s lips parted on a soft exhale, warm air shivering over Leo’s skin. He made no move to extract himself.
Leo kissed him.
The gap between a flash of lightning and the rolling of thunder. That’s what it felt like, waiting for Joshua to respond.
Leo kept the pressure light, a gentle brush of his mouth over Joshua’s, coaxing—and then, suddenly, Joshua turned into it, fingers tangling in Leo’s hair to pull him in.
Their noses bumped, and Joshua giggled softly even as he nudged closer, closer, mouth open and inviting.
Christ, yes. Leo was vaguely aware of Joshua’s knees digging into his chest. Mostly, he tasted salt and a hint of fruity sweetness, felt his own breath stutter around the realisation that he was kissing Joshua and Joshua was kissing him back; they were kissing.
He inhaled through his nose, glorious black flooding the space behind his lids and soothing his thoughts.
The playful touch of their tongues, kitten-rough, and when Leo pulled back for a quick, gentle nip to Joshua’s bottom lip, Joshua gave a tiny moan that was more a rush of breath, really. His thighs fell open.
Leo slotted into the space between them, cupped the back of Joshua’s head as they sank into the cushions together. The world tilted with them, lurching on its axis. Or maybe it was Leo’s heart lurching in his chest, like a drunkard trying to grapple for purchase.
Did that make sense? Nothing made sense. Everything made sense.
The buttons of their jeans caught as Leo pressed down, and Joshua exhaled on a breathy laugh that gusted over Leo’s chin. Why was he laughing? Was he laughing at Leo, with Leo? Was it normal for Joshua to laugh during sex?
“What’s so funny?” Leo asked, the words shaped against Joshua’s throat, and Joshua’s laugh cut off abruptly.
“Just…” he began, but fell silent when Leo slid a hand underneath his shirt, palm flat against Joshua’s stomach. Holding him down. “Just happy,” Joshua finished.
Leo’s lungs constricted around a hollow ache. He took a deep breath and claimed Joshua’s mouth for another kiss, Joshua’s fingers still tangled in his hair, their tips light against Leo’s scalp, grounding.
One kiss. One kiss, that was all it should have been, all Leo had wanted, but now—God.
With Joshua warm and solid against him, moving in incremental shifts, restless and responsive…
Leo wanted to learn everything there was—which touches would make Joshua gasp, what would have him squeeze his lids shut, how he’d rock into Leo’s fist, into Leo’s mouth, Leo’s body.
Whether Joshua liked it slow and deep, fast and rough, or anything in between.
Leo skidded his mouth along Joshua’s jaw, then pressed his nose into the spot below Joshua’s ear, curls tickling his forehead. “Hey,” he murmured. His voice sounded foreign in his ears, husky and thin. “What do you want? Tell me what you want, and I’ll do it.”
Joshua’s fingers tightened in Leo’s hair, one hand sliding down Leo’s back to settle above the waistband of his jeans. “You,” Joshua said simply.
It should have been cheesy. Instead, it made heat crawl up Leo’s spine and pool low in his belly. He lifted his head, certain that his cheeks were flushed, and waited until Joshua’s eyes slid open. Their green was no more than a faint suggestion, a little hazy, pupils large in the glow of the TV.
“That’s such a line,” Leo reprimanded, but he couldn’t help the twitch of a smile around his mouth.
“True, though,” Joshua told him. “I just want you. Whatever you want.” His pinkie dipped below the waistband of Leo’s jeans, brushed over bare skin and came to rest on the bump of Leo’s tailbone.
The implication had Leo’s thoughts stutter to a halt.
Fuck, yes. Yes, he wanted that. Wanted to feel Joshua any way he could, wanted—so much, too much.
Had never wanted anyone quite like this.
Rocking his hips down, he watched Joshua’s lids drift shut, could feel the outline of Joshua’s cock even through the denim.
Joshua’s lips parted on a hitched intake of air.
Leo dipped down to suck on Joshua’s bottom lip, and his ribcage felt split open, like the crater of a volcano which…
No, okay, that made no sense at all, what even was this tangled mess in Leo’s head?
Thoughts spinning like dust motes, catching random rays of light.
He pulled back enough to form words, words that he had to drag up from the tips of his toes. “Want you inside. Can I ride you? Can we do that? I want—in your big, fancy bed, make this so good for you. Josh.”
Joshua’s hips rocked up, and he turned his face away, into the backrest of the sofa. His body shuddered on a slow breath, seeming so overwhelmed that Leo wrapped him up in a hug, their chests aligned, no space left between them.
Leo didn’t ever want to let him go.
He pushed the thought away and hid his face against Joshua’s neck. “Can we?” he repeated, barely above a whisper.
Joshua’s response consisted of tumbling both of them off the sofa. He bore the brunt of the fall, muttered a softly surprised “Ouch” that had Leo chuckle against his jaw.
“Smooth, little prince. Gravity is such a confusing concept, isn’t it?”
“Shut up.” In spite of it, Joshua was grinning, straining off the floor to rub their hips together just once, cheerfully, before he pushed at Leo’s chest. “Up, up. Naked in my bed. Want you very much, please.”
Leo’s chest hurt with how lovely he was.
He scrambled to his feet and offered a hand to help Joshua up. Their fingers fitted; they fitted. But Leo couldn’t afford to think like that.