Chapter Eighteen #2
“He’s always very respectful,” Camille told them. “And very polite. Last year, I think he spoke to me more about my modeling career than you did.”
“Sounds like Breezy.” Phil didn’t defend himself, and Ben gathered from his sheepish expression that he was not, in fact, interested in Camille’s modeling career. “So, are you coming to the afterparty?”
“There’s an afterparty?” Camille asked.
“I’m throwing some steaks on the grill, and then we’re going to eat cake.”
“We have cake?” Ben asked. “Is the cake my present?”
“Nope,” Phil said cheerfully.
“You’re going to barbecue for the three of you, have a slice of cake, and call it a day,” Camille said. “For your wedding.”
“Yup.”
She turned to Ben. “That works for you?”
For a long time, Ben had assumed if he ever got married, it would be a Mormon ceremony with a woman.
The thought had never been appealing. Ben had been to enough temple ceremonies (the reception, not the sealing itself; he didn’t have the kind of status in the church required to attend, despite his parents’ best efforts).
They consisted of a lot of pageantry and ritual, accompanied by a boatload of expectations no couple managed to fulfill without looking very stressed the entire time.
As far as Ben was concerned, steak and cake were a huge step up.
“Why wouldn’t it?” he responded.
A bright, brilliant smile spread across Camille’s face. “Well done, Phil. You two are much better suited than we ever were.”
“I mean, I know,” Phil said. “But I did think you’d be a little shocked he’s a man.”
“That part was a surprise,” she admitted. “But the rest…”
“The rest?”
“When we met…” She paused to toss her hair over one shoulder, stroking it into place.
The gesture was so glamorous it took Ben a moment to place it as a marker of insecurity.
“You seemed like a very kind man trying very hard to appear like any other professional athlete interested in wealth, power, and status.”
“I thought you married me because of all the professional athlete stuff.”
“I married you because I wanted someone kind, and secondarily, because I wanted wealth, power, and status,” she said bluntly. “You don’t want those things.”
“Oh.” Phil laughed. “I guess that’s true. I just wanted to play hockey and be happy. Seemed the way to go at the time.”
“We had an all right five years.” Camille gave Phil a quick hug. “But we can both do better. Now, I have no intention of intruding on your wedding celebration. It sounds very boring. But I’ll be back tomorrow to pick up a few pieces around the house I know you won’t miss.”
Ben hoped the crochet blanket in the living room was one of them.
They went inside without her and had a steak lunch followed by cake, champagne, and sparkling juice.
Phil’s wedding gift turned out to be eminently practical and maybe a little romantic.
He’d had his financial advisor open a joint account for household expenses as well as given Ben the password for his various online services accounts.
“I’m not budging on the cleaning service,” Phil warned. “I didn’t spend fourteen years in the NHL to clean my own windows. But this way, we both have a say in everything else.”
The house did have a lot of windows.
Later, alone in the bedroom that was now theirs, and Charlie in bed for the night, he showed Ben the attached savings account with a college fund for Charlie.
“It’s just a start,” Phil said, and Ben had to stop getting undressed and stare at him, sitting on the bed with his banking app open on his thousand-dollar iPad.
“How much do you think college costs?” Ben asked.
“I don’t know. I never went.”
Ben debated telling him about federal grants and loans and state schools versus private schools. But he felt loose and warm from the champagne, and if Charlie had a nest egg when he finished whatever schooling he wanted to do, all the better.
Instead, Ben kissed Phil and handed over his own gift, which compared poorly on financial terms. He and Charlie had gone to Build-A-Bear and made a pair of stuffed sea lions connected by a heart.
Phil laughed as though it was the best gift he’d ever gotten.
“How are you feeling as a married man?” Phil asked.
“Not as different as I thought,” Ben admitted. “You?”
“Eh. Sorry about Camille.”
“Actually, I’m kind of glad I met her. Makes it easier to imagine that part of your life. Are you okay about her being here?”
Phil leaned back against the headboard. The stuffed sea lions sat in his lap, and he stroked across them idly.
“What she said about us, about me… When we got divorced, I thought our marriage had been all about how she wanted things to look, you know? All perfect from the outside, like something you could put in a magazine. But since I met you, I’ve realized I wanted that, too, so no one would look at me too closely. ”
Ben sat on the edge of the bed and rested a hand on Phil’s ankle. “You’ve adapted to not being straight much quicker than I did.”
“I’m thirty-four.”
“Yeah, but I figured myself out at fifteen, and it still took me six more years to kiss a man.”
“Okay, one, you had all the crazy family trauma to deal with. Two, my method involved kissing a man first and thinking about it later. I don’t think we can argue I was more well-adjusted.”
“It was a good kiss.”
Phil smiled and set the tablet aside. He drew Ben down for a kiss, much longer and more intimate than their first.
Ben was a little breathless when they pulled apart. “Okay, I think you’ve gotten better at that.”
“Hey,” Phil said. “You said something about fucking me?”
“Really?” Ben hadn’t said anything. Phil had mentioned it first, and now he mentioned it again.
“Do you not want to? I took a pretty thorough shower this morning. I promise.”
“Of course I want to, but do you? It’s a big step—”
“We’re married.”
“Well, when you put it that way…” Ben kissed Phil again, thorough and filthy, until he had Phil pushed back into the sheets, loose and easy under him. He kept at it for a while, just kissing with their bodies pressed together.
Ben reached between them to undo the buttons on Phil’s shirt. “I like you in this suit.”
“Thanks.” Phil slid his hand under the hem of Ben’s sweater, palming the skin gently. “I like you in no clothes at all.”
Taking the hint, Ben reared up and off Phil to strip off his sweater and shirt. Phil took the opportunity to sit up and remove his own shirt. The move compressed his flat stomach into rolls.
“You’re so hot,” Ben said mindlessly, tracing the lines of muscle under the swell of skin and fat with a fingertip.
Phil looked up at him, eyes round and wide. Ben expected a comeback, something to keep the easy mood going, but Phil only asked, “Really?”
“Yeah,” Ben said instantly. “Of course. You’re fucking gorgeous.
” He ducked to lick a line down the center of Phil’s belly.
The first prickles of stubble scratched against his tongue where Phil hadn’t waxed recently.
“You’re this big, tough hockey player, but the second I look closer, you’re so soft and touchable.
” He ran his hands down the outside of Phil’s perfect thighs and nosed his way between them.
He took the head of Phil’s cock into his mouth, suckling gently while he stroked Phil’s thighs, first from the outside and then from the inside, encouraging him to spread them open for him.
“You like all the things about me I tried to hide,” Phil said, breathless. “I didn’t know I could— I didn’t know anyone would like that.”
Ben swirled his tongue around the head of Phil’s cock before pulling off. “Hand me the lube?”
With his fingers slicked up, Ben dedicated himself to the task of telling Phil every single thing about him he appreciated while he opened him up as slowly as he was physically able.
“I like when you don’t shave first thing and you have a little bristle in the morning.
I like when you have a belly pouch after a big dinner.
I love your thighs, you know I do, how strong they are and how soft, and how the hair scratches my face when I kiss you there.
I love how you look after a workout, covered in sweat and all tight and firm.
Fuck, Phil, I like everything about you. ”
Phil squirmed on the bedsheets, relaxing incrementally around Ben’s first finger. “Even when I buy you expensive things?”
“I just don’t want to take advantage of you.”
“Oh.”
Ben used Phil’s momentary surprise to slide a second finger in. “I love how generous you are and how much you want to take care of the people in your life. That’s why all the guys on the team look up to you so much, you know? They see it too. I’m scared to depend on anyone, I guess.”
He crooked his fingers up and in, and Phil gasped, legs splaying wide. Ben’s wrist was quickly caught in a firm grip. Phil sat up again to look him in the eye.
“You don’t have to be scared with me,” Phil said. “I promise to never use it against you. I want the best for you and Charlie because I love you, not because I want power over you.”
Ben closed his eyes for a second. The words were still new, but the sentiment wasn’t. He kissed one thigh and then the other. “I know. I love you too.”
“Good.” Phil fell back into the sheets. “Now do that again; it felt amazing.”
“Bossy.”
Ben did it again, and Phil groaned. He did it a third time, and Phil shuddered around him, loosening so Ben could move his fingers faster, deeper. He did it a few more times for good measure, watching Phil’s mostly hard dick twitch every time.
He slid in a third finger and took the head of Phil’s cock into his mouth again, sucking him until he was fully hard, opening him until he rocked into Ben’s touch.
“Ben,” Phil said urgently. “Ben, now, you gotta do it now, or I’m gonna—”
Ben pulled away, mouth and fingers, and watched as Phil writhed for a long moment, his cock straining up against his stomach in a thwarted attempt at orgasm.