32. Open to You
OPEN TO YOU
LEV
L ev was knackered. He felt overexposed, his soul sanded down. Agoraphobia was a humiliating secret, a weakness.
After talking himself into brushing his teeth, he stripped his clothes, kicked them into the corner of his closet, and went to bed. He stared at the painted ceiling overhead and wished he hadn’t insisted that Asher should sleep in his own bed.
He didn’t want to be alone. He wanted Asher. He needed his lad to keep him company instead of the guilt and loss swirling around inside his head.
“Psst!” Asher said from his room.
“Yes, Blakely?”
“I wrote you a note.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, but don’t check until I tell you to.” Footsteps padded to the secret door, then back to Asher’s bed.
“Why?”
“If you see me, then I could just tell you what the note says.”
“You could tell me now.”
Asher’s bed creaked. “You can look. ”
Lev peeled back the tapestry and found a piece of paper torn from Asher’s sketchbook and folded in half. He took it back to bed and unfolded it.
“This is very sweet. Thank you. I’ll write you a reply in the morning. Until then, I’ll sleep with your letter and pretend that it’s you. I love you, Asher Blakely.”
“I love you too.”
Lev grinned. “I thought you might. Perhaps you should write it down though, so I can sleep with that letter too.”
A minute later, paper crunched, and a paper ball rolled into the tapestry. Lev was quick to collect it.
Lev laughed. A second paper ball hit the tapestry.
“I will treasure these always.”
“Careful you don’t get a paper cut.”
“That will only remind me of you and your sharp tongue and stabby sword.”
“Good night, Lev.”
“Good night, baby.” Lev held the letters against his chest like the sentimental sod that he was.
Sleep came as swiftly as the wind calling across the moor.
Lev woke in the dark. Even in sleep, a dormant part of his mind remembered the hollow swish of the tapestry lifted, and the creak of floorboards beside his bed.
Had everything been a nightmare after all? Was he only now waking up? What if Silas had never died? What if he was sneaking into his room after a row—one he’d started out of boredom or loneliness—and had come to apologize like so many nights before?
Lev almost said his name. Silas . Not out of excitement, but dread.
The dream he’d had before was filled with so much sadness, but it had finally started to get good, because Asher was there, and Asher made Lev feel like he could be happy again, like he deserved to be.
“Asher?”
A loud thump sounded.
“Fuck!” Asher said.
Lev bolted upright and pulled the string of the lamp beside his bed in time to witness Asher emerge from behind the tapestry, holding the top of his head, looking utterly adorable in one of Lev’s shirts.
The lad was tall, but he still had nothing on Lev, and the shirt hung down to just below his arse.
“Yes, I’d recommend crawling on your hands and knees next time. I learned it the hard way many times myself.” Lev sat at the edge of the bed and widened his legs.“Couldn’t sleep?”
“I wanted to surprise you.”
Lev clucked his tongue. Poor lad. He reached out and pulled Asher by the hand, sending him stumbling forward and between his widened legs. “Let me see your head.”
“I’m fine.”
“I’m sure you are, but you know how I fret.” He pulled Asher’s hand from the top of his head and examined it. No blood. He felt around Asher’s scalp. No bump either. The tightness in his chest eased.
Lev used both hands to push Asher’s hair back from his face and kissed his forehead. “Why couldn’t you sleep?”
Asher didn’t answer. Not verbally, anyway. He planted one knee on the bed and climbed into Lev’s lap. Lev gripped Asher’s arse, lest he fall backward off his lap. That’s when Lev realized he wasn’t wearing the tight boxer briefs he ordinarily wore.
“What’s this?”
Again, Asher said nothing, and pulled the shirt over his head.
The sight of his art on Asher’s skin and the marks he’d left on his neck captivated Lev.
Asher pushed against Lev’s chest until he fell backward, then bent and kissed him.
Lev groaned against his lips and reached down to palm Asher’s dick.
“Is this what kept you up? Do you need me to take care of this for you, Blakely?”
“No. I need something else.”
“Oh?”
Asher climbed off of Lev’s lap, and stripped Lev’s pants, so that he was as naked as him. “Get all the way up onto the bed.”
Lev was already halfway to full mast, and the command sent all his blood to his cock. He scooted up the bed, eyes locked on the hard cock swaying heavy between Asher’s legs as he crawled up the bed after him.
“You’re so fucking pretty,” Lev said.
Asher bit his smile back, but those dimples betrayed him yet again. Lev rubbed one dimple with his thumb.
“Especially when your smile is genuine. Though, to be fair, you’re just as pretty when you glower.”
“I don’t glower.”
Lev didn’t argue, didn’t want to.
“I can’t believe you’re mine,” Asher whispered, framing Lev’s face between his hands.
“I could say the same.” Lev’s attention snagged on the Icarus wrapping around Asher’s side toward his left flank, and he rubbed his thumb over the useless wings.
Asher shivered, squirming deliciously against Lev’s lap. “That tickles.”
“Sorry.” But he wasn’t just apologizing for that.
Lev was sorry he was selfish, sorry he hadn’t learned his lesson, sorry he’d stolen Silas’s life, and would steal what he could of Asher’s.
“Where did you go?” Asher asked, an echo of the same question he’d asked before, a question Lev knew he’d ask again.
“I’m here… and also in my head a bit about how much I don’t deserve you. Are you sure you want this with me?”
“I think it’s obvious I want this,” Asher said as he milked a tendril of precum from his tip.
“I mean, me. I’m older.” He winced. “What if I’m like Ben?”
“You’re not.”
Asher swirled his fingers to scoop up the precum and brought it to Lev’s mouth. No command necessary, Lev gladly obliged, but Asher didn’t stop there. Instead, he explored Lev’s mouth with his fingers and fed them down the back of his throat until he gagged. Then left them there.
“Ben would never let me do this.”
Tears dripped down the corners of Lev’s eyes to his temples, but he didn’t resist. He surrendered. When his throat stopped spasming, Asher looked at him with so much fondness.
“You make me feel powerful, Lev.” Asher pulled his fingers back, not completely, only enough to give Lev his throat back. “No one else has done that before.”
Moaning in need, and gratitude, and rapture, and too many feelings to name, Lev sucked Asher’s fingers obediently, thanking him with his eyes. Asher removed his fingers and bent to kiss him, and Lev realized how much he’d needed Asher to believe in him.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Lev said when they parted.
“I won’t let you,” Asher promised, pressing his forehead against Lev’s until everything else faded, until it was only now, only them.
Coincidental, sure. Asher had no way of knowing Lev had soothed Silas similarly, but it still meant everything. Silas had never returned the favor. Lev’s battles had been his to face alone, and yet this twenty-something American had offered him a sanctuary he’d never known.
“Do you trust me?” Asher asked.
“Yes.”
How could Lev not trust Asher when he still accepted him, in spite of his flaws, his agoraphobia, what little he knew of his past, and what lies of omission he could only guess at?
All the cards were stacked against them, and Asher was ready to shuffle the deck—or whatever the metaphor was. Card games had never held his interest. How silly to lose a large sum of money or priceless art in a game of mostly luck.
“I trust you too,” Asher said, drawing Lev’s wayward attention back.
“You shouldn’t.”
“Oh my God, Lev. Take the fresh start. If you trust me, you have to trust my judgment.”
“Why must you always be so contrary?” Lev teased.
Asher’s lips tipped up. “Because I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t call you out for your bullshit, and we wouldn’t be us if we didn’t bicker before we fucked.”
“Us? I like the sound of that.”
He also liked the suggestion that they fuck. Though that wouldn’t be possible tonight. Asher would need time to prepare before he took his cock.
“Yeah, us.” Asher knit their fingers together and trapped Lev’s hands at either side of his head. “Because this starts now with us. Whatever happened before doesn’t matter.”
That wasn’t true. His past proved what he was capable of. It made him who he was. A man without his past didn’t know himself at all.
“Now. Us,” Asher said, so close to Lev’s own spell.
Lev gave in to the strange symmetry that made him feel like they were destined for each other. Asher rewarded him with a kiss, and a roll of his hips, sliding his cock against Lev’s.
“Fuck, Blakely. You’ll be the death of me.” The only thing that would put him out of his misery was burying himself in Asher’s tight heat.
He could almost imagine the impatient frown Asher would make as he sank down, struggling to fit all of Lev in, too stubborn to stop until he needed to come more than he needed to prove Lev wrong. Lev would have to get off beforehand so he wouldn’t come before Asher did.
“You’re such a good lad.” Lev stroked the side of his face. “Go ahead and take your pleasure from me.”
Asher whimpered. “I need you inside me.”
Lev groaned and covered his eyes with his forearm. “Don’t tempt me.”
“I can take you.” Asher took Lev’s hands and guided his fingertips behind him to trace the cleft of his ass.
Lev stilled as he touched something smooth that wasn’t skin. “What’s this?”