Chapter 10
MILES
At first, Miles didn’t plan on mentioning what he’d seen.
Zach was a private person—guarded even with Miles—and he’d clearly kept this part of his life a secret for a reason.
Despite it being mostly an accident, Miles had invaded his privacy, and the smartest thing to do would have been to put it out of his mind and pretend it never happened.
That resolve barely lasted the walk home. Every time he looked over at Zach, tantalizing images crowded his brain, unspoken words dancing on the tip of his tongue. There was no way he’d be able to act like everything was normal for much longer.
Besides, he had questions.
“Do you…did you…how much did you read?” Zach choked out, beet-red and looking like he was about to pass out from embarrassment.
“Not a lot,” Miles rushed to reassure him. “Just what was on the screen, and…I might have scrolled up a tiny bit. A teeny, tiny bit, to see how the chat started!”
Zach closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then another. And another.
“Is there any point in pretending my laptop has a virus that opens random pages?” he asked. The familiar edge of his sarcasm was back, and Miles sighed in relief. Zach wasn’t pissed at him.
Yet.
“No, Zee.”
“Oh.”
“I could tell you’re SubZero. I’m guessing it wasn’t your first time there.”
Zach’s eyes flew open and widened. He looked so panicked that Miles couldn’t help lurching forward and gathering him in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, nuzzling Zach’s hair. “I didn’t mean to, I promise. I’d never go snooping on purpose. I got caught up in the moment and couldn’t help myself.”
Zach grunted into his chest, expressing either agreement or disbelief.
“What was that?”
Lifting his head, Zach grumbled, “Can we please never speak of this again?”
Miles was tempted to agree. He always wanted to give Zach anything he asked for, but the words refused to leave his lips.
He needed to know more.
“Can I ask a few questions first? A couple, that’s it. I promise I won’t mention it again.”
“Questions? Like what?”
Miles couldn’t fault him for the apprehension in his voice. This was far beyond the realm of their usual conversations. Some guys made a sport out of discussing their sex lives—Miles had run into plenty of those at college—but Zach had never been one of them.
Still, Miles had to know.
“I just want to understand you better.”
“Isn’t this weird?” Zach asked, “Talking about…this stuff?”
Miles rubbed his thumb in a circle around Zach’s hip, trying to think of a response.
“Is it? You don’t talk to Joel about it?”
Zach huffed. “It’s not the same, and you know it. Joel is gay.”
“Wait, you can’t talk to me because I’m not gay?
” When Zach stayed infuriatingly silent, Miles continued, “I wish you wouldn’t shut me out like that.
If you really don’t want to talk about it, I’ll drop it, I swear, but don’t keep secrets from me because you think I won’t get it. I want to know you, Zee.”
Zach’s fingers drummed a light rhythm against Miles’s hand.
Even as tense as a bowstring, Zach never pulled away, never tried to escape the embrace.
This show of naked trust almost overwhelmed Miles, making him want to wrap Zach inside his body and protect him from the world, to be his safe harbor forever.
“Having a personal life is not the same thing as having secrets or hiding. You don’t tell me about every person you fuck, and neither do I. I mean…” Zach pulled back, and a note of accusation crept into his tone, “You’ve never volunteered any details.”
“I would.”
“No, you haven’t,” Zach said indignantly, pushing away from Miles’s chest. “I think I would remember something like that.”
“I said I would,” Miles insisted, raising his voice and clamping down on Zach’s waist to prevent him from moving. “If there was something to tell, I would.”
He let the implication sink in, enjoying Zach’s stunned silence and wide eyes brimming with shock. “Are you…”
Yeah, Miles was a virgin. He wasn’t ashamed of that fact, though he rarely volunteered it, letting people assume whatever they wanted.
Mainly to avoid the awkward explanations to questions that inevitably followed, because the answer was very anti-climactic.
He just…didn’t want to. After learning the term, he wondered if he might be asexual, though he’d eventually discarded that train of thought.
He was attracted to people—mostly women, though he’d started noticing attractive men ever since Zach had come out to him.
Either way, he didn’t think that label was right for him.
He enjoyed porn. He wanted to have sex, looked forward to enjoying it one day, but there hadn’t been anyone who was worth the bother.
Miles smiled at Zach’s astonished expression and nodded. “I am.”
“Seriously? How? You’re so hot!” Zach exploded. “Are you waiting for marriage or something?”
A laugh burst out of Miles. “Definitely not. You know I’m not religious.”
“I know, but… How?”
He kissed Zach’s hair and cradled him closer to his chest instead of answering. Slowly, muscle by muscle, Zach’s tension melted, and he let out a sigh. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
Miles mulled it over. A million questions rushed through his head, stacking on top of each other, blurring into a giant mess of question marks. He wanted to know everything. And not the generic stuff he could find online—he wanted Zach’s own perspective.
“How did you get into BDSM? And why do you like it?”
Without being able to see his face, he couldn’t tell Zach’s reaction, so he waited in silence, content to concentrate on the soft puffs of breath across his chest. Finally, Zach spoke.
“I’m actually not…super into the whole D/s thing. At least not the way you’re probably thinking. It’s more of a bedroom-only kind of dynamic.”
“What’s D/s?”
“Dominant and submissive.” Zach let out a self-deprecating laugh. “I can’t believe I’m telling you about this. You probably think this is ridiculous.”
“No, I don’t,” Miles said firmly, giving Zach a shake for good measure. “Stop it. I’m asking because I want to know. I’m not gonna make fun of you or judge or any shit like that, and it’s fine if you don’t feel comfortable telling me.”
“It’s not that.” Zach sighed, his finger tracing Miles’s collar.
“It’s awkward. What am I supposed to say?
Hello, my name is Zach, and I get off on being tied up and dominated?
Doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.” He let out a mirthless chuckle.
“The truth is, I want someone else to be in control. To decide what to do with me, to arrange me how they want, to use my body for their own pleasure, to treat me like a sex toy. Fucked-up, right?”
“No, not fucked-up,” Miles rasped. Every word out of Zach’s mouth shot adrenaline into his veins, making his body buzz, his mind run wild. Focusing on the conversation with every last brain cell, he managed to come up with another question. “How did you know you were into it?”
It wasn’t just idle curiosity. A part of him wondered if this was the missing piece in his own story.
Zach squirmed and cleared his throat. “I think I always knew? But I didn’t do anything about it until college, obviously.”
Miles would have preferred not to think about Zach’s college experiments, but he couldn’t prevent the jealousy roaring through him.
Had Zach hooked up with some sweaty frat bros from his classes?
Or was it one of those sleek older men from the club, all black leather and sharp looks?
Did they treat his Zach right, or did they discard him right afterward and move on to the next target?
“Miles, are you okay?” Zach trailed a fingertip down his cheek, a frown marring his gorgeous face.
Was Miles okay? He wasn’t so sure anymore.
“Are you being safe?”
The question slipped from his lips at the idea of Zach being at someone else’s mercy. His stomach churned with the urge to destroy anyone who dared hurt him.
“Yes, Dad.” Zach rolled his eyes. “I always use protection and get tested regularly. And I’m on PrEP.”
“That’s not what I meant. Are you safe…during?”
“Oh.” Zach paused and bit down on his lip. “Yeah, I am,” he finally said with a determined shake of his head. “I never do full-body restraints, and I always have an exit strategy.”
Good enough. It had to be. Now that Miles knew about this part of Zach’s life, he’d never stop worrying about the dangers, but Zach was an adult, and he wasn’t helpless. Miles had a feeling Zach wouldn’t be helpless even with his arms and legs tied down.
“Will you show me your cuffs?” he asked in an attempt to redirect the conversation. “The ones you mentioned in the chat.”
“What?” Zach sputtered. “Are you fucking serious? No!”
He wriggled out of Miles’s grasp and hopped to his feet. Miles missed him instantly, lifting his hands in surrender, wishing he hadn’t opened his mouth. “I’m sorry, forget I asked. I was just curious.”
Zach paced the small distance between the couch and the bed, sending indignant glares in his direction.
After stalking back and forth for a while, he halted.
“Fine.” Without another word, he dropped to his knees and crawled under the bed, emerging with a black plastic tote.
“I can’t fucking believe I’m doing this,” he grumbled before popping off the lid.
Miles moved at the speed of light, worried Zach would change his mind before he got there, and plopped down on the floor.
“Go ahead.” Zach gestured at the tote in resignation, and Miles inched forward to peek inside.
If his skin was heated before, it was burning now.
His pulse had definitely dipped into heart attack territory as his fingertips gingerly brushed up against each item, taking them out one at a time.
The leather cuffs were as soft as described—malleable and buttery, connected by a thin silver chain.
Underneath, a length of silky rope was wadded into a ball, and Miles chuckled as he imagined Zach being too impatient to put it away correctly.
There were more things to discover, and Miles examined them thoroughly, wordlessly checking in with Zach before taking them out of the box—a pair of cheap fuzzy handcuffs, a blindfold, a contraption that resembled a collar with a piece of silicone in the front.
The faint indentations on its surface clued him in.
“It’s a gag?” he asked, and Zach nodded with a blush.
When he got to the bottom, he found a large purple dildo, the glossy silicone smooth under his fingertips. Miles had never seen one in person before, and he was fascinated by its shape, but as soon as he touched it, Zach gasped and swatted his hand.
“Nope, no, no, I don’t think so.” He laughed in embarrassment. “Look at the other stuff all you want, but I draw the line at anything that’s been inside me.”
Miles reluctantly agreed, wishing he didn’t have to stop, intensely curious about every single thing that had ever touched Zach’s body. But Zach had been accommodating enough. Especially after Miles managed to trample all over his boundaries.
He slowly started putting everything back inside.
Zach watched him for a moment with a smile. “You don’t have to be so careful. It’s not exactly the crown jewels.” Dragging the tote closer, he carelessly threw everything back inside and shoved it under the bed.
“Thank you, Zee,” Miles murmured once they moved back to the couch. “For trusting me with this.”
Zach scoffed. “First the gay thing, now this. Bet you wish you grew up next door to Peter instead.”
Miles chuckled at the mention of their prim and proper classmate from high school. “Nah. You have way better taste in movies than Peter.”
Zach laughed, the anxious creases around his eyes softening, and Miles breathed a sigh of relief as the tension between them dissipated.
He settled on the bed with his sketchbook to let his friend study in peace and mulled over their conversation. He hated how easily self-deprecating words rolled off Zach’s tongue. Even in jest, he made it sound like there was something wrong with him, like he was less.
But he wasn’t less. He couldn’t be.
He was everything.