Ride Me

by Rebecca Brooke

  “I’m gay.” He slid his hand into mine. “And Reagan is more than my friend.”

  Mari’s smile dawned like sunshine. Jackson stared at the two of us like he’d never seen either one of us before. Monty laughed and jumped up from his chair.

  “I knew it.”

  Sawyer’s head snapped in his direction. “What do you mean you knew?”

  “I’m an observant motherfucker.” He pointed between the two of us. “I saw the way you watched him. No guy watches another guy that way unless he wants in his pants.”

  “Jesus fuck, Monty,” Heath scolded, but Sawyer wasn’t done.

  “You knew and didn’t say anything? Why?”

  Monty stopped laughing and faced us head-on. “It was your secret to tell. I figured when you were ready, you’d tell us. Until then, it wasn’t my business.”

  “And you’re not pissed I didn’t mention it before?”

  Monty shrugged. “I figured you had your reasons.”

  “I did. But the more I think about them, the more ridiculous I realize they are.”

  Monty turned to me. “So, just an old friend from high school?”

  I laughed. “Up until a month ago, that’s exactly what I was. Things change.”

  The corners of his mouth turned up. “I’m happy for you two. Maybe now you’ll stop writing such brooding songs.”

  “Maybe, maybe not.”

  Sawyer’s hand squeezed mine. I could see the release of tension from his shoulders. It was as if the weight of the world had been lifted from them. A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. I wanted to press a kiss to those inviting lips. I glanced around the room first wondering how people would react to seeing us kiss. That’s when I noticed Jackson still hadn’t moved or said a word. In Monty’s uproar, I’d forgotten about Jackson. I nudged Sawyer in the ribs. When he focused in on me, I gestured my head to the corner where Jackson sat.

  Sawyer let go of my hand and walked around Monty to stand in front of Jackson. “What about you, man? Does me being gay bother you?”

  Jackson looked up as if he’d just figured out that Sawyer stood in front of him. “What?”

  “I asked if it bothers you.”

  Without a word, Jackson stood and pushed past Sawyer to walk out the front door.

  “Fuck,” Sawyer cursed, plunging his hands into his hair and tugging on it.

  I couldn’t stand by any longer. I pushed off the wall and went to Sawyer. When we were kids, I refused to let the jerks who tried to push Sawyer around ’cause he was in band get away with that shit. Even after he got big enough to take care of himself, it didn’t stop me from watching out for him.

  He still hadn’t turned from the empty seat vacated by Jackson. I took his shoulders in my hands and turned him to face me. The color had drained from his face. Ignoring the reactions of everyone else in the room, I pulled him close and said only loud enough for him to hear, “What can I do?”

  His eyes met mine. The sadness and worry reflected in them was devastating. “Nothing.” He spun out of my hold and disappeared down the hall, presumably to his room. That was the first time since he kissed me that he’d walked away like that.

  “Christ, this is a mess.” Heath sighed.

  I turned to see him looking down at Mari, who now had tears in her eyes.

  “What do we do?” I asked the room, hoping one of them would have an idea of how to bring them back together.

  “I need to figure out why Jackson’s so pissed off right now.” Heath looked at Mari, then over at Monty.

  Monty flopped back down into his seat. “If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say he’s pissed because everyone knew but him.”

  “Maybe, but that’s not what Sawyer is thinking right now. He’s pacing his room worried he single-handedly destroyed the band because Jackson hates him and the fact he’s gay,” I said.

  “Shit,” Cole spoke for the first time since the whole shitshow started.

  I started toward the hall. “I’m going to get Sawyer to come back out here, but I need someone to get Jackson to listen to him if he does.” Heath stood and pointed at me. “Go deal with Sawyer. We’ll,” he said, gesturing to everyone else in the room, “go and calm Jackson down. He doesn’t hate Sawyer. It won’t matter that he’s gay. I think Monty’s right. He’ll get over it in a minute.”

  Jackson wasn’t something I could worry about right then. I followed Sawyer’s path down the hall and opened the door. True to my word, Sawyer was wearing a hole in the middle of the floor. I shut the door behind me and locked it. Right now, there was no need to have an audience for our conversation. Knowing there were very few things that would calm him down, I stepped into his path and tilted his face up to meet mine. His eyes glistened.

  “Everything is going to be fine.” I pressed my lips to his.

  After a moment, he took a step back. “How can you say that? I just ruined everything we worked so hard for over the last few years.”

  I took hold of his shoulders and gave him a brief shake. “That’s bullshit and you know it. He’s pissed because he’s the only one who didn’t know.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “I can’t be positive, but he has no reason to hate you, and everyone agrees. They’re talking to Jackson now.” I took his hand and led him to the end of the bed to sit down and relax for a few minutes.

  I took his chin between my thumb and forefinger, holding him in front of me. This was not the confident Sawyer I knew staring back at me. A shadow of doubt lingered in his eyes and I wanted to figure out a way to remove it, whether it had to do with me or not. “Talk to me. Do you truly believe you’ve just destroyed the band? Or is it something else that has you hiding instead of confronting Jackson like I know you normally would.”

  He tried to pull his face from my grasp, but I wouldn’t let him. I needed to look in his eyes as he answered me. Slowly lowering to my knees, I kept the connection of our gazes. A sigh left his lips.

  “A little bit of both. I guess a part of me knows they wouldn’t care, but I wonder how it will affect our sales if the press gets wind of it. Or what will happen with your job?”

  When it was clear he wasn’t going to try and pull away from me, I let go of his chin and ran my hands up and down his thighs. “And what if they never find out?” In reality, the idea seemed impossible, except a part of me hoped it wasn’t. I knew the partners would be very accepting of our relationship and until I figured out where else to go, I needed the job. How could you hide a relationship from anyone indefinitely? And that left me as the dirty little secret, something I didn’t want to really think about then.

  “You want to hide this forever?” He gestured between the two of us.

  “No, I can’t imagine I would, but everything between us is so new, I’m perfectly okay with staying out of the limelight for a while.”

  He lifted a brow. “Forever.”

  “Not forever. At some point sneaking around won’t be enough for either of us. Today is not that day. And until I find a firm whose opinion on gay associates is higher than my current one, I need it to stay quiet. But someday that won’t be a problem.”

  He closed his eyes and flopped back onto his bed. “Why do I feel like I’m pushing you and you’re going to hate me in the end?”

  Did he really believe that? After coming back here the night he kissed me to the time we’d spent together over the last few weeks, the weight of his words pressed in on my chest, making it difficult to breathe. I’d do just about anything to see him smile or laugh. My hands continued to run up and down his thighs, trying to offer comfort, except at the same time I was beginning to drive myself crazy. My own cock began to harden as I felt the muscles beneath my fingertips flex and jump with each stroke of my hand.

  I wanted to show him how much he wasn’t pushing me into anything. The button and zipper of his jeans were just out of reach as my fingers slid higher and higher with each pass. My thumbs lightly grazed over the outline of his cock, feeling it b
egin to swell and harden. Finally, I reached the top and in seconds had his pants undone and his dick in my hand.

  The mushroom head begged to be tasted. Knowing what I liked, I swirled my thumb over the head. It still seemed weird to have a dick that wasn’t my own in my palm, yet somehow it felt right. This was more about jerking him off. We’d done that. To prove it was my choice to be there, it needed to be more. So, for the first time in my life, I bent my head and stuck my tongue out to lick across the tip. The salty taste of him hit my tongue. Not once did I let my gaze waver from his. His eyes snapped open, locking with mine.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Showing you I’m here because I want to be here.” I did it again and enjoyed the soft moan that left the back of his throat.

  “Fuck, everyone is out there and you choose to suck my dick for the first time right now.”

  With my free hand, I reached up and covered his lips. “Yep. I guess you better be quiet then. Now lie back and I’ll do my best to make sure you enjoy it.”

  I bent my head and wrapped my lips around the head of his cock. Since I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, I figured the best thing to do would be everything I liked. I swirled my tongue around the tip again as his fingers slid into my hair. For a moment, I thought he might hold my head in place. When his grip on my hair tried to pull me back, I swatted his hand away. We both needed this.

  “Let me do this for you, even if I’m bad at it.” I begged him with my eyes and flicked my tongue, drawing a line up the underside of his cock.

  A guttural moan tore past his lips and the hand against the back of my head released its grip, pushing me toward his prick instead. Opening my mouth, I took him back in my mouth and drew him in as far as I could go. He was too big to take to the back of my throat without any practice. That was something I’d have to work on. And I had little doubt Sawyer would mind being my practice dummy.

  “Oh fuck,” he cursed. “You could never be bad at this. Just the thought of you with your lips around me has me ready to blow my load in seconds.”

  I lifted my head and wrapped a hand around his shaft, gliding it up and down. “You better not come yet, or I’ll stop and this is all you’ll get.” For emphasis, I moved my hand to the base of his cock and squeezed hard enough to slow him down.

  “Shit, don’t stop. Don’t stop.”

  With a smirk, I lowered my head again, sucking him down and using my hand to add extra friction along his dick. Each sound and curse that came from Sawyer’s lips pushed me even further. He fisted his other hand into the sheets by his side, his knuckles turning white. I used my free hand to take hold of his balls and swirled them around in my palm. Knowing how much I liked the head of my cock played with, I drew my lips back up him and went to work on the tip, sucking and tonguing the slit.

  “Fuck… Oh Fuck, I’m gonna come,” he called out, once again tugging on my hair.

  My first instinct was to pull off and jerk him through his release, but something stopped me. I wanted to take him all the way and if that meant swallowing on my first ever blow job, then that’s what I’d do. My dick pulsed in my jeans. I bent my head and increased the suction I had on him. His body jerked and the first jet of hot come hit the back of my throat. Without any other option, I swallowed him down, just in time for a second and third jet to hit me. I didn’t pull off until his dick began to soften in my mouth.

  His eyes were closed as he panted for air. Damn, I knew how to torture myself. I was so hard, I had no doubt I could pound nails into a two by four. There was no time for relief, so I reached down into the top of my jeans and snaked my way down until I was able to wrap my hand around my prick and squeeze. No way did I want to spend the rest of the night stuck in soggy jeans.

  I assumed I’d done an okay job when Sawyer lifted his head and gone was the worry in his eyes. It had been replaced by a deep satisfaction and sense of relief.

  “That was incredible. I’m not sure I can move.”

  CHAPTER 25

  Sawyer

  My brain had melted into a pile of mush. I was shocked I’d been able to form a coherent sentence.

  “Really? It was okay?”

  Those dark eyes lifted to meet mine and the vulnerability there blew my mind. He was trying to hide the fact he felt insecure, but I could see it there in his eyes. Something he didn’t need to feel with me. I wasn’t lying when I told him that his lips around my dick would make me come. What I hadn’t expected was how expertly the man played my body. If I didn’t know any better I would have thought he’d done it before.

  “Okay? I think shooting my brains through my dick says it was more than okay.”

  The simple words brought the confident smile back to his face. Each one of my muscles no longer felt as if they would crack under the strain. As much as I wanted to stay in my room, in our own little bubble, I knew I needed to talk to Jackson. There was no avoiding it. Reagan’s hand snaked down to grip himself through his jeans. He hadn’t come yet. I covered his hand with mine.

  “Let me take care of this for you.”

  He shook his head. “Not right now. That was for you. Right now you need to talk to Jackson.”

  “But—”

  “No buts.” He leaned forward and pressed his lips to mine. I could taste myself still on his tongue and my dick twitched. I didn’t think I’d be able to get hard again after coming so spectacularly. Boy, was I wrong. My dick hardened even further. Then again, with Reagan, I had no idea what my body might be capable of. He kissed up my jaw line to my ear. “Besides, you can make it up to me later. Now get dressed.”

  I nodded and stood from the bed to fasten my jeans. “Can’t we just stay in here all night?”

  He walked over and stood before me, taking my hips in his hands and pulling me closer. “While I would love nothing more, you won’t be able to sleep right or focus on all the things I want to do if you’re worried about Jackson.”

  “I’m not sure I can do this,” I whispered, looking down at the ground. “I can’t have him abandon all of us.”

  “If he’s actually willing to abandon you for being who you truly are, then he wasn’t meant to be part of your life anyway.” He took my hand and led me to the door. “But I think you’ll be quite surprised at what you find out there.”

  Reagan led us from the bedroom and down the hall, still refusing to take his hand from mine. When we reached the living room, I stopped dead when I came face-to-face with Jackson. I swallowed the lump in my throat and nodded to the kitchen. “Can we talk? Just the two of us?”

  He nodded and walked through the door connecting the two rooms. I followed him and braced myself for the tirade I knew was to come. But when the door shut behind me, he said nothing, just crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the counter, waiting for me.

  This was no time to beat around the bush. Better to know what I was up against than to keep myself guessing. I went straight to the point. “Do you have a problem with me being gay?”

  Jackson shook his head. “What? Is that what you think?”

  I ran a hand through my hair. “I have no idea what the fuck to think. I tell you my biggest secret and you’re the only one who storms off, making me think I ruined everything. So I’ll ask again, do you have a problem with me being gay?”

  Jackson sighed. “No. God no. Sorry. I didn’t mean to make you think that. I’m pissed because you kept something that big from me. I’ve trusted you with plenty of things over the years, and yet you couldn’t trust me.”

  “It had nothing to do with trust. I don’t want to be the gay musician.”

  “You had no problem telling everyone else before now. Fuck, even Cole knew.” He began to pace the floor of the small room.

  “I didn’t tell Monty. The observant little shit that he is figured it all out on his own. And the only reason Cole knows is ’cause Mari begged me to tell him. He thought I wanted her.”

  “Heath and Mari?”

  “They lived with me
. I’m not a damn virgin.”

  He stopped in his tracks. “Oh, and I guess Mari and Heath just happened to be in the right place at the right time?”

  I leaned back against the counter. “I’m not sure what you want me to say.”

  “Put yourself in my shoes for a minute. How would you feel if I kept something this big from you, but come to find out everyone else knew?”

  “Fuck…” My head fell forward. “I should have told you before now. We’ve been friends for years. Please tell me I haven’t ruined that.”

  “No, you haven’t.” I moved my gaze back up to his. Jackson pulled out a chair and took a seat. “But there’s something I want to know.”

  I took the seat across from him. “What’s that?”

  He drummed his fingers on the wood. “Why now? Why keep something like that from us all these years? You had to know we wouldn’t give a shit who you had in your bed.”

  I leaned farther back into the chair. “You’re right. I knew you wouldn’t care, but I used it as an excuse.”

  “An excuse for what?”

  It would probably piss him off, but I gave him the truth anyway. “If it weren’t for Reagan, I probably would have kept hiding it from everyone.”

  Jackson narrowed his eyes at me, but I continued before he had a chance to say anything.

  “Before him I had no reason to come out. I knew I’d never want another man the way I wanted him, and he was straight, or at least I thought he was. When he showed up at that meet and greet, I still hadn’t been ready to tell him. It wasn’t until he caught me hooking up with a guy on his floor that he knew.”

  “You love him.” It wasn’t a question. It was a statement about the reality I’d yet to deal with when it came to Reagan.

  “I’ve loved him since I was sixteen years old. I spent years in college trying to forget or at least fuck him out of my head. Which is why I told Heath. I didn’t want him to walk in on something he wasn’t expecting.”

  Jackson fell silent and sat quietly for so long, I braced myself for the possible explosion. Of the five of us, Jackson was the most level-headed and reasonable in any situation. He had a way of looking for the positives in everything. Most of the time. Deep below the surface lurked a raging temper. One that when pushed to the limit would come out swinging.