Fifteen
Miles C
thanks for last night. going to take me awhile to sleep and scrub all that off, but would you come by later?
Sure. Katie and I are heading in to the practice courts, but we’ll be back mid-afternoon
perfect, see you then
WHEN I MADE my nervous way to his door that afternoon, I found it already sitting open. Not for me, but because a guy with square glasses and an undercut was backing out clutching a large plastic bag to his chest.
“Yeah, anytime,” he said. “Just tell us what you need and we’ll be here.”
“Oh, wait,” came Miles’s voice from inside. “Another hat. Sorry.”
The man laughed and paused his retreat. “Just put it on top.”
I reached the door as Miles set a fedora rakishly atop the bag. “Oh hey,” he said, his smile broadening in a way that couldn’t but make me smile back. “Good timing. How was practice?”
“Pretty good,” I said as Undercut Guy readjusted his grip on the bag and headed off along the narrow corridor. “I’m feeling the court. Hitting well. Bicchieri is a whole other problem, but—”
“Nah, you’ve got him.”
His easy confidence in my skill was always a little baffling, but he hadn’t been wrong yet – a fact I decided to cling to rather than argue. I nodded toward the stairwell as the fedora-topped bag wobbled out of sight. “What was that?”
“Those clothes,” Miles said, gesturing for me to come in. “Tina had them sent over because I got pissy and refused to go to her stylist. They came to pick them up.”
I stepped into his once more fastidious apartment, no sign left of the bombsite from the night before. There were even fresh flowers. “Oh, so you don’t just travel everywhere with a whole wardrobe of slutty eveningwear ready to go?” I said. “Disappointing.”
So easy to slide back into our former banter, to pretend like nothing had changed.
He was in the complete opposite of slutty eveningwear this afternoon, wearing a torn and faded pair of jeans and an overlarge long-sleeved shirt.
It was an afternoon on the couch outfit, yet he made it look hot because he was Miles Callahan and, whatever else I might be desperately ignoring, I had an endless boner for Miles Callahan.
“I can probably pull off slutty without that much help,” he said, coming to stand before me, hesitant like he wasn’t sure what was allowed anymore. “Thanks for last night. I know I already said that, but I think it bears repeating.”
“You’re welcome,” I said, unable to meet his gaze. “It was fine, really.”
“And, uh, thanks for not taking advantage of my . . . drunken enthusiasm. It was good of you. First time that’s ever happened.”
“Really? That’s depressing.”
“Yeah, I guess it is.”
Desperate to lighten the mood before the sincerity crushed me, I said, “I would have been very well served if I had, since you would inevitably have puked all over me.”
Miles winced. “Which, as we all know, is desperately hot. Might have ruined all chance of ever getting back in your pants.” He drew a step closer, and gently ran his hands down my back, stopping as he hooked his thumbs into the waistband of my shorts.
“Is that what you’re trying to do?” I asked.
“I don’t know what I’m trying to do,” he admitted, voice husky. “But I want to know if we’re okay. Did I ruin this?”
For a moment, I could only shake my head and catch my breath. Then, “No, you didn’t ruin it. I thought I did. You just wanted a convenient fuck buddy and I went and forced my trauma on—”
“No.” He gave a vehement little shake of his head.
“Don’t make excuses for me. You were right.
I fucked up and you deserve better. I shouldn’t have made my choices your problem, especially when I’m the one who .
. .” The words hung, and he ran his tongue along his lower lip as though in memory of that kiss, his eyes dark and heavy-lidded.
“It won’t happen again. I promise. I’ll take better care of you from now on. ”
Care of me. I swallowed hard. “We can just not hang out in public, right? That’s fine.”
He breathed out a humourless laugh. “No, Mat, it’s not, but let’s call it a work-in-progress for now. And I’m sorry Tina called you.”
“She was fine,” I said. “I can’t blame her for caring about you.”
“Yeah.” His lips twitched into a rueful smile. “Doing her damage control.”
“With the help of your on-again, off-again girlfriend?”
Miles looked faintly surprised. “You mean Emily? On-again, off-again because we’re only on whenever there’s talk, or when Tina thinks it’s been too long since I took any super-straight pictures.
” He tilted his head, examining me as he slid his fingers around the inside of my waistband, his touch soft. “I hope you’re not jealous.”
Something about the gentle proximity and his loose sweatshirt gave the moment an intimacy I couldn’t withstand, and I smiled up at him. “Not anymore,” I said before I could stop myself. “I’m the one you came home to.”
His lips parted like I’d sucked the air from his lungs. From the room. From the world. Nothing left but a tight silence in which he stared down at me, stunned, and into which he finally forced a laugh.
“That’s true. I was extremely horny,” he said and thank god he did before I could say anything even stupider. “Although, was is not quite the right word,” he added, his hands unfreezing in their path around my waistband.
“Oh? Is that blowjob still on offer then?” I asked, desperate to push us back toward the safety of sex. We were running out of time, after all, the number of days we both had left in London dependent on how long we could stay in the tournament, and I faced Bicchieri tomorrow.
A grin broke across Miles’s face. “Is that what I tried to do last night?”
“Yeah. You stuck your face in my crotch and told my dick you missed it.”
He screwed up his nose. “Embarrassing, but accurate. God, it really is hot when you ask for things though.” He dropped his lips to my ear, sending a shiver through my skin as he murmured, “you know what? I would love to suck you off, but I want you to keep asking for things, so why don’t we play a game? I only do what you tell me to.”
“You want—?”
“Which also means I will do everything you tell me to.”
I drew a sharp breath on that promise, on the hunger in his eyes when he drew back. “Are you sure?”
“Very.”
The idea seemed to excite him, yet since Miles never did anything without reason, I couldn’t but wonder if this was also an apology gift, or another way of pushing me out of the ruts in my head.
But whatever else it might be, it was also a challenge, so I rose to it and said, “All right. Get on your knees.”
He dropped to his knees before me and looked up, faintly smiling. Ah, so he was also going to make me ask for everything.
“Suck me,” I said.
With the ease of much practise, he gripped the waistband of both my shorts and boxers and yanked them down.
I’d already grown a semi, and he wrapped his fingers around it before running his tongue up the underside and sliding it into his mouth to let it finish swelling between his lips.
He looked up at me as it did, dark eyes peering through long lashes in a way that was desperately unfair.
“Shit,” I breathed, the word cracking into a moan as he took me into his throat.
The first time he’d done this I’d been so caught up on the fact he was doing it at all – that this very hot, very famous, very straight tennis star had my dick in his mouth.
Later, I’d thought about how practised he was and had envied every man he’d ever touched.
Now, I wished I could claw the memory from their minds so I could keep him only for myself.
It was a terrible, possessive, red fucking flag of a thought, but as he went on sliding his mouth up and down my length, his soft, black eyelashes fluttering, I wanted no one else to ever have this.
“Fuck, stop!” I said, as he drew me far too close far too fast.
Miles let my cock slide from his mouth and looked up, one brow raised in question.
“Take off your clothes.”
A hint of his wicked smile flickered as he stood to comply.
The loose shirt was pulled effortlessly over his head, while he kicked the jeans off like the top button had barely been keeping them up.
He had nothing on underneath, just the necklace and bracelets that seemed more part of his skin than accessories.
Task done, Miles spread his arms, such confidence in the way he invited appreciation.
“Get on the bed.”
The smile returned, or perhaps it never went away. Leaving me to follow, he turned and strode naked into his bedroom, where he dropped onto the neatly made bed in a floof of soft bedding. One knee up, he spread his other long leg invitingly, fixing me with those eyes that could beg without words.
I wanted to do everything to him and he would have let me—have loved it—the knowledge so intoxicating I could not trust myself to lay so much as a finger on that precious skin just yet. Not while this was the game we were playing.
“Touch yourself,” I said. “Like you would if you were alone.”
Miles spat into his hand and started to stroke himself, the easy, filthy sexuality of such an act as thrilling as the speed with which he complied.
If he had any misgivings or nervousness, it didn’t show as he slowly sped his pace, eyes on me while his hand slid up and down the full length of his hard cock.
I didn’t dare touch my own, everything about this far too hot to risk the contact.
“Fingers,” I said, wondering how far he would let me push.
He lifted amused brows. “Fingers? What about them? Use your words, Matteo.”
“Fuck your arse with your fingers.”
His lips parted on a groan. “Did I say you were hot when you asked for things? It’s even hotter when you’re demanding.” He reached for the lube in his drawer and was soon running a slick fingertip around his hole. “How many do I start with?”
“Two.”
“Is that your Goldilocks number?”
“What?”