by Jana Downs
“Thank you. I’m a lot of work, huh?”
Brandon chuckled. “Not as much as you seem to think you are. We’re golden, and I am so happy I found you.”
“Stalked me,” Evan teased.
“Okay. Stalked you,” Brandon said, grinning.
“Brandon? You here?” an unfamiliar voice called from somewhere in the interior.
“Yeah. I’m here.”
They turned in time to see the cute blond-haired man stride through the archway leading from one of the hallways in a pair of swim trunks. He looked vaguely familiar, but Evan couldn’t place exactly where he remembered the guy from.
The blond smiled brightly as he looked at the two of them. “Oh good. You shifted back. You’re Mr. Cartwright, correct?”
Evan nodded. “Yeah. Do I know you?”
“Oh yes. I work at sHarmony. I helped you fill out the paperwork at the head office downtown. I run the front desk. I’m Quinn.” He extended his hand for a shake, and Evan took it.
“Nice to see you again, Quinn. Sorry for dragging you out of work to take care of this.” It was an apology.
Quinn shrugged. “No big.” He motioned at Brandon. “That one lets me use the pool whenever I feel like it. It’s really nice not to be stuck in an aquarium.” He smiled brightly once again. “I’m so happy to meet you. You suit him. Physically I mean.” He paused. “And mentally. You two with the techno-babble. Two peas in a pod.”
“Um, thanks?” Evan said, puzzled by his babbling.
Brandon chuckled. “Did you get the saltwater tank set up in the study?”
“It’s filling now,” Quinn said, smiling cheerfully. “I’ve got the salt bags out and rearranged the coral insert. The cooling and heating units needed a little tweaking, but I managed to tighten everything down and adjust the pump.”
“Awesome. Thanks, man.”
Quinn nodded. “Well, I guess I’ll get back to work. I’ll check in with you tomorrow. You mind if I swing by after I get off and take a dip? I won’t bug you guys.”
Brandon nodded. “No problem. You know you’re welcome anytime.”
“Okie dokie. I’ll change, and then I’m outta here.” Quinn went to the front closet and took out the bag from there before disappearing into the side bathroom.
“Come,” Brandon said, pulling him away from the foyer. Evan swayed a little bit, and Brandon’s eyes narrowed. “You’ll feel better when we get you into the water again. For a bit you’ll feel a little strange out of the pools, but you’ll get used to the motion of the land soon enough.”
“Didn’t I just spend half my day in a tank?” Evan asked, annoyance creeping into his voice. He wasn’t trying to be difficult. His physical weakness and weird restlessness was getting on his nerves. He didn’t want Brandon to think he was some pathetic weakling.
“Hey now, don’t get snappy with me.” Brandon led him to the back door where they could move into the backyard and the pool beyond. “I’m not the enemy, Evan.”
“I know,” Evan murmured, shaking his head to dispel his melancholy. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re stressed. I get it. I can’t imagine it was fun for you to be stuck in your animal form in an insecure place. You were scared.”
Shame followed on the heels of his annoyance. It wasn’t fair of him to take out his instability on Brandon. He was trying to help. The condom broke. He’d practically taunted fate to make it happen. “Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing,” Brandon said, his feet tapping on the stone path that led to the pool. “Let’s just spend some time together and try to relax.”
The scent of salt and water drifted up to tease Evan’s nostrils, and before he could stop himself, he was jogging toward the pool. Brandon’s soft chuckle sounded behind him as he jumped into the pool, clothes and all.
As soon as the water rushed over his head, bubbling around him in a pleasing rush, everything in him settled. It felt like home. Another splash sounded as he broke the surface, and he turned to see that Brandon had joined him.
“You stripped fast,” Evan noted, his eyes wandering over Brandon’s naked body. He sighed in appreciation. Fate rocked when it came to playing matchmaker. His lover was gorgeous.
Brandon shrugged. “And you didn’t strip at all.” There was a teasing note in his voice. “Maybe you need some help?”
Evan shivered at the new tone and swallowed. “Yeah.”
Brandon crossed the difference between them and pressed their lips together. Evan sighed happily, gladly opening his mouth to admit Brandon’s tongue. The man’s hands went to his waist, and he lowered his zipper slowly before pushing them off his hips to let them sink to the bottom. Their kiss broke briefly as he pulled his shirt overhead before tossing it aside.
“Feeling better?” Brandon asked against the seam of his lips.
Evan blinked slowly, trying to process the question as every instinct inside of him screamed that Brandon needed to take him. He wanted to mate in the worst way. “Yeah. I’m good now. Water helped.”
“Thought it might.” Then Brandon’s lips were tasting him again, and he didn’t need to think anymore. The larger man backed him into the wall as Evan wound his hands around his thick neck and his legs around Brandon’s waist.
“Fuck me,” Evan begged, rubbing his cock against Brandon’s stomach as the water sloshed over the side of the pool. He ached in the worst way.
Brandon growled. “Here?”
“Yeah. Here. I want it here.” He needed it here.
“Gonna be rough without lube,” Brandon said, gripping his hips and lifting him onto the lip of the pool. “Gonna need to get some.”
He wasn’t sure what that meant, but he was game for whatever Brandon wanted from him so long as he didn’t stop touching him. He cried out as Brandon’s mouth wrapped around his cock and sucked him straight into the back of his throat. “Yes!” Evan yelled, his head tilting back into a near howl.
Brandon sucked him like he wanted to make him come as quickly as possible, driving him hard and fast toward the precipice of release. He gasped. “Brandon, slow down. Gonna—”
“Come for me, beautiful boy,” Brandon snarled, coming off his cock for an instant as he continued to milk Evan’s body with his fist. He whimpered. He didn’t want to come yet. He wanted his lover inside him before he came. Brandon growled. “Don’t fight me, Evan.” He wrapped his mouth around him again, and Evan nearly lost it.
Evan shook his head, unwilling to yield to the command. His hips shot skyward of their own accord, fucking his cock deep into Brandon’s willing throat. “Oh God. Oh God. Oh God,” he chanted, rocking against the onslaught to his senses. He didn’t even care that he was scraping his ass on the concrete. He was too far gone to give a damn.
He whimpered as his balls drew up painfully. He wouldn’t be able to resist much longer. Brandon’s hand wrapped around his sac and squeezed. It was enough. He murmured a warning as he came, emptying his pleasure into Brandon’s sucking mouth.
Without preamble, Brandon pulled him off the wall and flipped him around so that his chest collided with the concrete. His breath left him in a whoosh, but he didn’t care. Instincts older than his resolve to disobey had him in their grips, and nothing would satisfy him but more of Brandon’s body.
Something wet touched his entrance and it only took him a second to realize it was Brandon’s tongue. Animal sounds erupted from his mouth as Brandon tongue fucked him, pushing Evan’s own cum into his channel. He clawed at the concrete, needing to hold onto something as his drained cock refilled, aching for another orgasm.
At last Brandon seemed satisfied with his work because he pulled him the rest of the way into the water. His cock was below the waterline as Brandon spread his cheeks and pressed the thick head of his cock to Evan’s entrance. He shoved deep, forcing his channel to accommodate all of him in one feral thrust. Evan couldn’t breathe for a moment as the burn stretched on. He groaned at the sensation, pushing back against Brandon as the man pulled alm
ost all the way out before slamming deep once again. The water churned around them with their movement.
“Fuck! Yes!” Evan gasped, unable to do much but hold onto the concrete as his lover pounded inside him. Brandon popped his ass with the flat of his palm.
“Sexy boy,” Brandon rumbled. “Love watching you lose control.”
He loved losing control for Brandon, but he couldn’t think of the words to say. He made a strangled noise of pleasure as Brandon scored his internal pleasure spot. It was the best he could manage. Within moments he was on the verge of release, straining toward the edge of pleasure he knew was just beyond his reach. Sex had never been as good as it was when it was with Brandon. He was addicted to the feel of his mate.
“Gonna come for me, beautiful boy?”
“Yes!” he yelped, wanting to feel his lover inside him. The grip on Evan’s hips tightened, and a desperate edge overwhelmed them both.
Brandon buried himself to the hilt inside Evan’s ass, groaning as the first stream of spunk filled him. The action was what Evan needed to push himself over the edge of the abyss. A scream lodged in his throat as he came, spilling his essence in the frothing water of the pool.
The world froze, and the only sound was their harsh breathing and the occasional sound of motor traffic as it passed on the street.
“You okay, beautiful?” he asked, nuzzling the curve of his shoulder blade as he waited for whatever would come next.
“Hmm I don’t know,” Evan murmured, resting his face on his forearms. “I think you killed me. I’m pretty sure you have.”
Brandon’s low chuckle sounded from behind him as he slowly slipped from his body. “Come on, beautiful. Let’s swim for just a little bit, and then we can go relax in the house.” He liked the fact that Brandon took care of him. It made him feel terribly dependent, but that was okay. Brandon was his mate after all.
He winced as his hole was left empty. He enjoyed feeling his lover locked inside him. He wanted to stay with him always. He expelled his breath at the unfamiliar clinginess. The new instincts he had were difficult to manage.
As an octopus, he thought that he would be immune to the utter obsession a lot of shifters had toward their mates. After all, his base animal was a solitary creature by nature. It didn’t make sense for him to want to be with Brandon all the damn time. He just hoped that Brandon felt the same way. He should’ve listened when the other man had told him to hold on and take it slow. Evan was forever rushing into things, even good things, and then overwhelming himself.
“You okay? You got quiet,” Brandon said, pulling him away from the wall. He gently stroked his sides, clearly trying to give him comfort.
Evan let himself be pulled into the water, and he immediately stretched out his arms to stroke the warm water around him. It was the perfect temperature. It was strange how comforting he found the water now. He’d never really been a pool guy, but now he apparently was. He smiled, tipping his head back to wet his hair. “I’m fine. I’m overthinking things as per usual. Don’t mind me. I’ve been on an emotional roller coaster today.”
Brandon nodded like it was to be expected and sank to his neck in the water, sighing softly. “I don’t want you worrying too much about us, Evan. We’re a very new couple, but it shouldn’t matter. We’re mates.”
“I know. You don’t have to lecture,” Evan said. He wasn’t being mean about it. He was just intellectual enough to understand that his emotional responses were because his body was still in the curious position of being used to human reactions and relying on animal ones. “We’ll work it out.”
“I want you to know that I’ll do my best to take care of you as my mate,” Brandon promised, mimicking Evan’s motions by stroking his arms out into the water. “I want you to be happy.”
It was something he’d promised on more than one occasion now. “We’ll make one another happy together,” he said, wanting to convey the equal nature of the relationship even if Brandon was an apex predator and somehow outranked him on the dominance scale.
Brandon smiled. “I should’ve known you were going to remind me that we’re on equal footing.” He chuckled. “I keep expecting you to freak out. A lot of other humans would’ve freaked out. But not you. You have moments of fear, but you haven’t let it overwhelm you yet.”
“Well, I can’t be typical,” Evan teased, feeling pride in the words. He had doubted his reactions all night, fearing that he was burdening his new mate unnecessarily.
Brandon ducked in for a kiss before pushing away and slicing through the water. “Why don’t you shift, beautiful? I think it would be good for you. You need to have confidence in your ability to shift from one form to another.”
He didn’t want to admit that he was scared of the possibility. He wasn’t going to be too happy about having to shift often in this initial period. He’d expected to love this, and now that he was a shifter, he wasn’t so sure he did. “I’ll wait,” he said, running a hand through his wet hair. “I have spent all afternoon as an octopus. I don’t know if I’m eager to repeat the experience.” It was weird, but it felt almost like the other side of him was hurt by the admission, which was ridiculous. It wasn’t like he could hurt his own feelings.
Brandon frowned. “I know your first time wasn’t exactly the happiest memory, but shifting into your other form is a very freeing experience. I promise. Once you figure out you can go back and forth without any trouble, you’ll be more comfortable and be able to see that.”
All the relaxation he’d gotten from sex went right out the window. He felt like a little kid pouting over not being able to do what he wanted. He was being lectured like one. “Maybe in a minute,” he hedged. “Why don’t you go ahead and shift.” He shivered at the prospect. He had never had a death wish, and swimming with one of the ocean’s top predators didn’t seem like such a swell idea overall.
The expression on his lover’s face was unreadable. “Okay.” In an instant, Brandon was gone and a massive shark cruised the pool in his place.
Evan’s heart started to pound. He wished Brandon had given him the opportunity to get out first. Despite the fact that logic said that Brandon wouldn’t hurt him, an older instinct said, “Big shark. Run the fuck away.”
He bit his lip as Brandon circle closer, the movement slow and lazy. But Evan had watched Discovery Channel. He knew that it took only a second for a shark to go into attack mode. He swallowed. Okay. It’s not a shark. That is Brandon. Except it looked a lot like a shark.
He held out his hand as Brandon passed, stroking his side as he veered off just in time to miss running Evan over. His skin felt like it had before, rough. He mentally shrugged. This wasn’t so bad. There was nothing wrong with touching his lover like this. He eyed the filter cover where it opened and closed with the current of the pool. Well, if push came to shove, he could always shift and go hide out in there for a little bit. Laughter bubbled up at the thought.
“I’m a little more afraid of sharks than I thought I was,” he said. Just because Brandon couldn’t talk back didn’t stop him from doing it. Evan was talking more to calm himself down than anything. Brandon slowed down as he circled back, barely moving as he allowed Evan to touch all he wanted. “Well, as long as the bitey end is facing away from me, I guess that’s all right.”
He stroked down Brandon’s side. It struck him that six months ago he’d never even known a shifter, at least not one who was out of the closet, so to speak. He didn’t know what it felt like to have two forms or have a lover that had two forms. This was magic. Pure and simple. And he couldn’t understand why people were afraid of them, really. They were average joes with a twist.
He sank to his neck as Brandon had done and took a deep breath. This was no different than taking his first steps as a baby. He just needed to stop clinging so tightly to the safety net and do it. The question was, how did he manage to shift last time? He couldn’t really remember, and Brandon hadn’t exactly given instructions.
Viewing it as
a computer problem helped somewhat. He needed to assess which pieces of data had contributed to the shift and figure out how to access them. Easy enough. Except it wasn’t exactly easy. He tried to wrap his human understanding around the life of an octopus. He hadn’t felt solid, like he had much more flexibility than his heavy human frame. He’d assessed the world in terms of safe and not safe. The water had felt wonderful on his skin, and his gills had taken a good amount of comfort from the familiar breaths as he forced water over them. It had been a relatively calm experience despite the fact that he couldn’t figure out how to resume a human shape. Like his human life, his octopus self had assessed the world in terms of puzzles. Figuring stuff out came second nature.
Something inside him shifted, and he finally found the opening he’d been too scared to take a minute ago. Without preamble he reached for the shift and was a little terrified when his body immediately complied with his request. Within moments he had shifted back into an octopus. He stretched out his limbs, drifting toward the bottom of the pool in an effort to stretch out. Oh, that felt fantastic. He might not have started out as a water lover, but that was certainly different now. He was all about the cool liquid comfort.
Brandon kept his distance as Evan got used to his environment, alternating between swimming and walking along the bottom of the pool.
“Good job, beautiful,” a muffled voice called from the surface. Evan looked up to see Brandon in his human form standing a foot or so from him. He was smiling. “Enjoy yourself. When you’re ready, shift on back and we’ll go get something to eat.”
Evan would’ve nodded had he had a neck.
Brandon swam around the pool, an awkward animal in an environment not his own. Evan giggled at how silly it looked for a human to swim. They just weren’t built for it. Not in any way shape or form. How he never realized it before, he didn’t know. But looking at things from this perspective definitely showed him what his human eyes had failed to see. It’s a wonder ocean predators don’t eat us more often. He walked along the white bottom of the pool and admired his color as it changed with his footsteps. That is cool. If humans could do this, tanning beds would be out of business. Okay. Maybe being a shifter was as cool as he’d originally thought.