My Anti-Marriage

by D. J. Jamison

  “Chris,” Ant said gently, even as his heart ached at the idea of Chris standing at the altar with some other man. “You’ll have that again.”

  “But it won’t be the first time. Even if no one else knows, I will.” He blew out a breath. “But I’m being silly and romantic. Chances are I’ll never marry, so it hardly matters. I should just call it a night.”

  Chris turned, slipping his keycard into the slot in the door. Ant placed a hand on his shoulder. “Wait.”

  He gently pulled Chris around to face him, then hand still on his shoulder, said, “Chris Everett, I take you to be my lawfully wedded husband.”

  “What?” Chris said with a little laugh.

  “To have and to hold, through sickness and in health,” Ant continued.

  “Ant, you don’t have to do that.”

  “To cherish and worship and love with every beat of my heart. Till annulment do us part.”

  Chris smiled, shaking his head. “Pretty sure that’s not how it goes.”

  “Close enough. Now you.”

  “You’re crazy,” Chris said with another laugh, but he obediently repeated the hodge-podge vows Ant had recalled on the fly.

  “You may now kiss your husband,” Ant murmured.

  He waited, eyes locked on Chris. He wasn’t sure Chris would want to continue playing along, but what he saw in Chris’s eyes hit him like a punch to the solar plexus. So much emotion darkened them he didn’t know how Chris could contain it all. He looked on the verge of crying, but he was smiling so wide that Ant’s heart, soft as it already was for Chris, turned to mush.

  Chris moved first, swaying in toward Ant, those mesmerizing eyes fixed on his until the moment they slipped closed.

  His lips brushed Ant’s in a featherlight caress. It was a kiss worthy of any church wedding, but the touch, light as it was, set Ant on fire for more.

  Heart hammering, Ant whispered against Chris’s mouth, “I need more than that.”

  “Good,” Chris said, a teasing note in his voice, “because I was just getting started.”

  Lust that Ant had suppressed for months came roaring to the surface, making him frantic with need. With Chris giving him the greenlight, he could hold back no more.

  Ant crushed him to the door, kissing him hard. Chris wrapped an arm around his neck, a leg around his hip, and parted his lips with a moan. Ant pressed his tongue inside Chris’s mouth, reveling in the spicy taste of him. He forgot everything but the smell and taste and feel of the man he’d been craving for so long.

  He forgot, too, that they were in a public hallway until the ding of an elevator startled them. Ant looked over his shoulder to see a couple stepping out.

  Chris broke away to unlock his door and tugged Ant inside.

  “Kiss me again.”

  Ant happily obeyed, stumbling as Chris wrapped his long limbs around him while Ant tried to move them toward he bed. They stumbled into a wall, where Ant got lost in grinding against Chris’s body before sense returned enough to get Chris horizontal.

  They landed in a pile on the bed, laughing breathlessly.

  “Get naked,” Chris ordered. “I want you to do your husbandly duty and fuck my brains out.”

  “Really?” Ant asked, suddenly remembering Chris’s strong animosity toward him since their breakup.

  “Yeah,” Chris said. “We’re married now. Might as well make the most of it, right?”

  Ouch. Was that all this was for Chris? Ant didn’t want sex to be some kind of consolation prize, though he could live with that. He was more concerned Chris would regret being so impulsive later. And if Chris regretted it, how would Ant ever win him over for good?

  “You’re sure you want this?” Ant asked.

  “Have you seen yourself?” Chris replied, running his hands under Ant’s shirt. His fingers traced abdominal muscles, then swept up to his pecs. Chris squeezed, pressing his hand into Ant’s pectoral. Groaning, Ant lost his train of thought.

  He kissed Chris again before pulling back to say, “I’ve wanted you for so long. I never stopped, not even for a second, while we were apart.”

  Chris’s hands faltered, body growing tense.

  “It’s not the same for you,” Ant guessed.

  “Ant …”

  Ant pressed a soft kiss to Chris’s lips. “It’s okay,” he said. “But I’d like to tell you about Raul, once and for all.”

  Chris shook his head, eyes falling shut. “No, thanks.”

  “Chris, look at me.” Ant kissed eyelids tipped with gold lashes, causing Chris’s eyes to flutter. “Please.”

  Chris sighed, looking at him. “I just want you to make me feel good. I don’t want to talk about the past. I don’t want to think. Can’t we just … feel for right now?”

  Ant shook his head regretfully. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but no.”

  “No?” Chris sounded incredulous and considering how blatantly Ant had tried to get in his good graces since their breakup, Ant couldn’t blame him.

  Ant pulled back, sitting up so he could think more clearly. Chris’s body pressed against his wasn’t conducive to reason.

  “You’ve spent all this time thinking I’m a liar and a cheater, and I’m not that man. I don’t want to be that man.”

  “Fine, I believe you. Now fuck me.”

  Ant’s dick liked the sound of that, but the throwaway words hurt. Chris wanted his body now, but would he ever really want Ant, the person? If he wouldn’t hear him out, he didn’t see how Chris could ever really trust Ant with anything important.

  He stood up, backing toward the door. “I think I’m going to go,” he said hoarsely. “You got some bad news tonight, and I think maybe you’re just looking to comfort yourself. If you and I do this, I need it to mean something.”

  Chris sat up, looking angry. “You think it wouldn’t mean something to me?”

  Ant looked at the beautiful man on the bed, his perfect hair mussed and his body primed to mold to Ant’s. And it hurt, physically hurt, not to give in to the desire he’d felt for Chris since they met.

  But he didn’t want one hot night in Vegas. He wanted all the nights. And if he screwed Chris now, with their past hanging between them, unresolved, he didn’t think he’d ever have that.

  “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “Maybe it would, but can you promise you wouldn’t regret it?”

  Chris looked away, his silence its own answer.

  Ant nodded to himself, his chest feeling like concrete. He squeezed words around the lump in his throat.

  “I’ll just let myself out.”

  “Fuck you, Ant,” Chris said. “Fuck you for being so … and then this—”

  Ant took in Chris’s glittery eyes and flushed cheeks. God, was he really going to turn down this devastatingly handsome man?

  “Go then,” Chris said, taking the matter out of his hands. “See you around.”

  “Don’t be mad. I’m just trying—”

  “I need you to leave,” Chris said in a steely voice. When he met Ant’s eye, his expression was harder than Ant had seen it in a long time. “But for what it’s worth, no. I wouldn’t have regretted it. Now, though? I’m regretting a lot of things.”

  Chris didn’t wait for him to respond. He left him standing in the middle of the bedroom, gobsmacked by his own idiocy, and slammed the bathroom door behind him.

  Ant tapped on the bathroom door, but there was no answer. He cleared his throat. “I’m going.” He paused, listening for a reply, but there was nothing. “I’m sorry.”

  Then he left, feeling like a jackass.

  Chapter Eight

  Chris didn’t feel like going out, but after pulling a runner the night before, he owed it to Brad and Riley to be the best man they’d asked him to be.

  He pulled out the tightest jeans he’d brought on the trip and a thin, clingy shirt. He pretended, as he adjusted his junk in the cramped confines of his jeans, that he wasn’t dressing to show Ant exactly what he’d missed out on
. He knew Ant liked his body. It was Chris’s attitude that was the problem.

  Is it really so bad he doesn’t want you to have regrets? It’s almost chivalrous.

  Chris snorted, annoyed at the thought. He didn’t need chivalry. He needed a man who gave him what he wanted. And what he’d wanted in that moment was to be fucked within an inch of his life.

  Still, not a very player-like attitude to have. Ant had a sure thing in front of him and he turned it down. Plus, the way he said those vows? Pretty romantic.

  Dwelling on it wouldn’t do any good, so Chris slapped on cologne and grabbed his wallet.

  The guys had texted him the address for a classy little restaurant with high ceilings, gorgeous light fixtures, and contemporary art decorating the walls. It wasn’t their usual type of hangout, so Chris quirked a curious smile as he joined Brad and Bret at a table, carefully not looking at the bar, where Ant and Riley stood talking to the bartender.

  “So, what’s this about?” he asked Brad, knowing that he was the most likely architect of their plans.

  “It’s the night before my wedding,” Brad said. “I thought something a little more tasteful was in order. Also, this is kind of a surprise for you.”

  “For me?”

  Brad nodded toward the bar. “They make absinthe here, and I know you’ve always wanted to try it.”

  Chris glanced over, trying to ignore the breadth of Ant’s shoulders. The ridiculous man had switched out basketball shorts for track pants, but he still looked underdressed for their sophisticated surroundings.

  It was Friday night, but late enough the dinner rush had ended, and the bar was earning its keep. The clientele seemed to be a mix of couples in their thirties and forties, most of them dressed for a night out, but a night out at a dinner party as opposed to a wild dance club. There were one or two gaudy Hawaiian shirt and khaki pants combinations among the men, but all the women looked classy.

  Their group stood out for three reasons: they were younger; all male; and dressed more casually. Chris noticed more than one look flitting their way, but no one stared disapprovingly. He suspected Vegas was the kind of place that got all sorts, so most people weren’t as bothered by differences in style and class as they would have been in Kansas City.

  “Look, the bartender’s making one now,” Bret said, nudging Chris.

  He needn’t have pointed it out. Chris’s eyes widened, taking in the flames shooting up from the glass of green absinthe.

  “How do they do that?” Chris asked in wonder.

  “They soak the sugar cubes in absinthe, then light them on fire,” Bret said.

  Chris got up and wandered over to the bar to watch the process, observing how the bartender placed a sugar cube on a spoon, balancing it across the top of a new glass of absinthe, and struck a match to light it.

  “We let the sugar cube burn for a minute until it begins to melt,” the bartender explained as he went through the motions. “Now, I’m going to lower it so that the absinthe catches fire too.” He paused, shooting them a wink. “Don’t try this at home.”

  Ant chuckled, and Chris worked to ignore the appealing timbre of his voice. He was already too aware of Ant, sitting a few feet from where Chris leaned on the bar to watch the bartender.

  The bartender carefully lowered the spoon of melting sugar into the glass until the liquid caught flame. He dunked the spoon to leave the sugar in the glass, then withdrew it.

  “Now it’s going to burn off some of the alcohol. Don’t want you all going too crazy tonight.”

  “There’s been enough of that going around,” Chris murmured.

  The bartender glanced at him, a flirty smile on his face. “Well, it is Vegas. A little crazy is to be expected.”

  “I prefer the kind of crazy that I remember,” Chris said.

  The bartender laughed. “Fair enough. One of the nice things about absinthe is that it doesn’t affect you like your typical cocktail would.” The bartender began gradually adding water as he spoke, careful not to douse the flame, until the drink was nearly full. “Contrary to some myths, absinthe won’t cause hallucinations. But it is more stimulating than typical alcohol. You will most likely feel incredibly clear-headed.”

  “Could have used that recently,” Chris replied.

  “Well, tonight’s your night,” the bartender said, shooting Chris another grin. “Now, just watch this beautiful green fairy burn bright. Then I’ll blow her out, and you can actually put absinthe to the test.”

  Ant made a noise that was difficult to interpret. When Chris glanced over, he was glaring at the bartender.

  Not wanting to miss the show, Chris turned his eyes back to the glass of absinthe, where the flame continued to burn and a green nebula had formed at the center of the drink and begun to writhe. It swirled, creating fascinating patterns.

  “It’s not necessary to light the absinthe to get this interesting cloudiness. All quality absinthe will give you that. But it makes for a fun show.”

  The bartender leaned over the glass, blowing out the flame. Then he slid the glass toward Chris. “Enjoy.”

  “Oh.” Chris stepped back. “I’m sure Ant was ahead of me.”

  Ant shook his head. “Take it. I’m sticking to old-fashioned beer. I just wanted to watch.”

  Chris glanced to Riley. “What about you?”

  Riley smirked. “Take your pretty drink so nicely offered, Chris.”

  Something about his tone made Chris look back at the bartender, noticing with some surprise the way his eyes skimmed over Chris’s body. He abruptly remembered the tight outfit meant to taunt Ant and felt a little embarrassed. He’d dressed for a dance club, not an upscale restaurant.

  “Thanks. How much do I owe you?” Chris asked, reaching for his wallet.

  The bartender leaned forward, placing his forearms on the bar. He was slim and attractive, with dark hair that fell over lovely gray eyes. “It’s on the house.”

  Chris blinked. “What? No, I …”

  Ant pressed up behind him, his body warmth seeping through the thin fabric of Chris’s shirt. He reached past Chris to lay a twenty on the bar. “I’ll buy it,” he said firmly.

  Chris tensed, wanting to argue but feeling too awkward as the bartender smiled and shrugged. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”

  He picked up the twenty and deposited it in a cashbox behind the bar, then set to making another absinthe cocktail.

  Chris picked up his drink and took a tentative sip, his taste buds bursting with licorice flavor. “Whoa,” he said.

  “What?” Ant asked near his ear.

  Chris suppressed a shiver and stepped back, forcing Ant to give him space. “The flavor is interesting.”

  “That’s the anise,” the bartender put in, earning another dirty look from Ant.

  Chris took his opportunity to slip past Ant and head back to the table. He sat down across from Brad and beside Bret. “Where’s Harry?”

  Bret pulled a face, looking guilty. “We had a fight. He went for a walk to cool off and said he’d meet us later.”

  “What happened?”

  Chris sipped the absinthe, not really feeling the rush of strong liquor. He felt perfectly lucid, but then he’d only had a few sips.

  Bret glanced at Brad, and surprisingly perceptive for once, Brad stood. “I’m going to go watch the show and cop a feel of my fiancé. It won’t be long before he’s a boring old husband, so I have to make the most of it.”

  Chris chuckled. “You’re nuts.”

  “Just wait until you get married. Then you’ll understand.”

  That statement sliced through his moment of humor. His smile fell as Brad walked away, his gaze involuntarily returning to Ant, his husband.

  He stood by the bar, a bottle of beer dangling from his fingertips as he talked to Riley. But as Chris watched, Ant looked up, catching his eye. When he looked over Chris’s body, much as the bartender had, Chris’s pulse jumped.

  He turned back to Bret, trying to push down
the frisson of excitement. “So, tell me what happened.”

  “Only if you tell me what’s up with you and Ant.”

  Chris hesitated. “Not sure that’s a good idea. I don’t want to disrupt Brad and Riley’s wedding weekend, you know?”

  Bret nodded, sipping from a bottle of beer. “I’m not them. And I’ll keep my mouth shut, if you want to talk. If not, I guess that’s okay. But I’ll tell you, I don’t really want Brad and Riley to know my business either.”

  “Oh.”

  “Not because they aren’t just as good of friends,” Bret said quickly. “They love Harry—”

  “They love you too. We all do,” Chris clarified.

  He kicked himself for letting the craziness with Ant take over. He’d hoped to get to know Bret better on this trip, and to make sure he understood he was their friend just as much as Harry was.

  “Thanks,” Bret said. “It’s just, you were all his friends first.”

  “Yes, but we like you too,” Chris said. “Besides, you guys are a package deal. Can’t have one without the other.”

  “But what if we break up?”

  Chris pushed away his absinthe, narrowing his eyes at Bret. “I don’t believe it’ll happen. Harry worships the ground you walk on.”

  “But you know. About me, I mean.”

  Chris tilted his head. “The asexuality?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Is Harry unhappy?”

  Bret shook his head, looking miserable. “Worse. He proposed.”

  Ant gulped his beer, irritated he’d let the bartender’s flirting get to him. Riley’s amusement wasn’t helping either, so he was relieved when Brad came over to distract his fiancé. Harry joined Ant at the bar a few minutes later, giving him something new to focus on.

  “So, why are we here of all places?” Harry asked.

  “We’re here for the absinthe,” Ant said, nodding toward the table where Chris and Bret sat in intent conversation. Chris had one hand over his mouth to cover a shocked expression, and Ant wondered if he dared to approach.

  He regretted walking out on Chris now. He looked gorgeous, as always, but his sex appeal was ramped up to one hundred. Ant couldn’t decide if Chris seemed hotter because his painted-on jeans barely contained his ass or because Ant had been so close to the forbidden fruit. Probably the latter, he decided. Disappointment burned in his gut. Not that he wanted only Chris’s ass. That was the whole problem. He wanted all of Chris: his tight ass, his beautiful face, his smiles, his trust.