by Willa Okati
Jesse wanted to reach for him, Daniel thought. Maybe even wanted to push his head back and take him by the hair and pull him closer. Instead he kept his hands to himself, knotted by his sides, but those hands were shaking.
Daniel didn’t move his head. He spoke with his lips nearly touching denim, and the hardness rising beneath it. His body reacted the same, burning and gnawing deep in his gut, but he ignored that and put all his mind on pleasing Jesse. “Don’t worry about feeling me. Feel yourself. What’s happening inside you.”
“Darren…”
“Shh.” Daniel pressed his mouth to the shape of Jesse’s cock. Jesse drew in a sharp breath. His stomach muscles jerked, nudging his hips forward. Probably not on purpose, but that didn’t matter. “It’s all right. Let me. I want to.”
He sensed it, though he couldn’t have said how he knew, when Jesse gave in. A moment later, he felt the ghost of a touch graze the top of his head. Fingertips that wanted to sink themselves into his hair. Better. Better and better…
Daniel breathed in, wanting to catch the taste and smell of Jesse on the flat of his tongue. Slowly, slowly, warning Jesse of every move he made before he made it, he found his way to the broken tab of Jesse’s zipper and drew it down, click by click. He wore soft-washed jockey shorts beneath, skin-warm, ripe with his scent. When Daniel pressed his nose to the cloth, Jesse’s cock jerked hard against his cheek.
The mark rising on Daniel’s wrist throbbed. Jesse flinched and took hold of his arm. He’d felt that.
Good.
Daniel reached up without looking and caught Jesse’s wrist gently, gently and guided his arm back down. He rubbed his thumb once over the faint embossed lines taking shape over Jesse’s pulse, and pushed Jesse just that bit more firmly against the stone wall of the old folly. He could build them himself, and he could break them down, and he could find a way out.
His hands were steady when he guided the tight stretch of cotton, damp and warm, down Jesse’s hips, and they held Jesse as if he were made of glass and steel. They moved as if without conscious instruction, letting want and need be their guide instead of neurons and meat. This wasn’t how it should have been, but it was what they had.
Jesse threaded his fingers through Daniel’s hair. His chest shuddered with the force of a long, long sigh.
Daniel took Jesse into his mouth and let Jesse breathe for both of them.
Oh—God. Jesse’s head struck the wall when he jerked in surprise, even if he’d known it was coming. Struck it hard enough for the shock of pain to make him swear under his breath, and to grip tighter at Darren’s hair.
Darren made a small, pleased noise and took Jesse deeper into his mouth.
Not everyone waited for their soulmate. Some did. Others figured practice made perfect, and they enjoyed every chance to build up their skill set. Jesse hadn’t taken anyone into his bed since the first awful failure, not long after he’d first come home. He didn’t like to think about that night, when he’d realized just how deep the damage went.
But Darren… It was as if Darren knew all this, and didn’t care. Don’t worry about me, he’d said. Let me worry about you.
He took Jesse’s cock into his mouth as if that were the single thing that mattered, and oh… oh, God, oh…somehow, he made that true…
And every little bit better he got brought him closer to the day he’d be good enough to find his soulmate. Their names were almost the same, he thought, tightening his hold on Darren’s hair. Even if this man had almost nothing else in common with the brave kid he remembered, their hair was the same, soft and dark. Soft.
“Just feel,” Darren said, a whisper hot against the crease of his thigh. “It’s okay. I promise. Just feel.”
He could. God, so tight, so hot. Like nothing in—years. Like nothing forever. Darren’s mouth…
Jesse bit his lip to keep the groan behind his teeth, or tried to. It didn’t work. The noise slipped out between his lips, low and animal.
Feel himself, Darren had said. But he’d rather feel Darren. Jesse rubbed his face against his sleeve, as best as he could, and blinked his eyes clear to look down. Couldn’t see much but the top of Darren’s head, blue-shining-black where the rare glimpse of light struck him. That, and Jesse’s cock, dark and thick, glossy with spit, widest where Darren lingered and lavished the most attention.
Jesse’s knuckles creaked. He had to be pulling too tight, but Darren didn’t complain. He whispered soft things and soothing noises, and though he rocked his hips, he didn’t reach for himself, not once. He burrowed his head against Jesse’s stomach and dragged the lightest graze of teeth against Jesse’s hipbone. He wrapped his hand around Jesse’s cock and stroked while he spoke those quiet words, and took Jesse deeper, faster, when he chose to be quiet.
Not quiet, though. Not really. The slick, slippery sound of lips and tongue echoed loud, loud, against the stone walls of the folly. Blood rushed to Jesse’s head and galloped in his ears. He’d dropped his head back without knowing it, the stones hard and unyielding when he arched his neck. His face had gone hot, and his lips dry from the quick-fast rush of his breath, but nothing burned so much as the gut-deep ache in his groin.
He wished they were in a bed together. Somewhere he could lay Darren out across a mattress and see what he looked like with his clothes off. Where he’d been the one to take them off, a stitch and a piece at a time, laying bare the smooth, dark skin to be kissed. He could imagine it the way he hadn’t been able to in years. Could almost know, already, what Darren would feel like stretched out beneath him, a cradle of his legs and a circle of his arms both hot and hard and holding Jesse there as if he were the most wanted thing in the world.
Jesse shuddered as a wave of sensation nearly took him over the edge. Not yet, he wanted to beg. More. Anything. Everything. Just more.
“Feel,” Darren ordered, lips on his cock. He dipped his head to take Jesse’s balls in his mouth then back again, and off. “Feel this. Feel me.”
Jesse could. Too much. Not enough. He could feel it coming. Too fast, and for a moment he wanted to pull out, catch his breath, make it last, but he couldn’t have stopped himself. Years, it’d been. Years. He tugged Darren’s hair harder on purpose, warning him.
Darren understood, he could tell, but he didn’t listen. He took Jesse by both hips and held him still while Jesse choked on the knot of words and wants unfurling on his tongue. Then Darren took Jesse’s cock in hand and guided it across his face, cheekbones and chin, the bridge of his nose, and under the dark tickling fan of his lashes, and back to the velvet flat of his tongue—
And Jesse—
Daniel caught the spurts of cum, salty-thick, first on his lips then on his tongue. Heavy stuff, rich as cream. He didn’t think Jesse was the sort of man who took frequent care of his needs. Maybe he wasn’t able to find release on his own.
He’d feel bad, later, for being glad just then. Later, when he’d swallowed down every drop Jesse had to give and more, when the memory of shudders and bitten-back gasps had stopped echoing in his head.
Just then…Jesse belonged to him. No one and nothing but him.
“Shh,” he said, over and over as he licked his lips and gentled Jesse with lighter touches to his hips and sides. His stomach and his groin cramped, wanting their share. Daniel didn’t dare to even try. One touch and he’d go off like a cork drawn from a bottle, but he didn’t matter just then. Jesse did. “Shh, shh, shh.”
He waited for Jesse’s breathing to even out, deeper and more regular, before he pushed himself to his feet. Then and only then, did he brush his lips across Jesse’s one more time.
The last thing he’d expected was Jesse’s arm going strong and firm around his waist, or Jesse locking him where he stood, or Jesse pushing a hand behind his head to hold him steady so he could deepen the kiss just as he liked…but that was what he got. Daniel moaned, his knees unlocking, shocked and relieved in equal parts when Jesse pulled him roundabout so his back met the wall, and the folly
held him up.
Jesse kissed as if he’d been starved for touch for years. He had, Daniel realized. How lonely that must have been. He was ready for it when Jesse broke the kiss to drop his head hard on Daniel’s shoulder, forehead tight to the curve of Daniel’s neck. “It’s all right,” he soothed, brushing back Jesse’s hair. Softer than he’d imagined.
My mate, mine, in my arms. Finally.
Daniel held Jesse with the left side of his body, and turned his right forearm so the wrist faced him. He could see the mark now. Still had a ways to go before it turned as dark and bold as ink, but the shape was making itself clear. Almost Egyptian in design. A divided circle, with figure eights woven through it.
Jesse exhaled a hard shudder against Daniel’s shoulder. “I didn’t…” he started. “I did. I felt that.”
“I noticed,” Daniel said, pressing a kiss to Jesse’s temple. He hesitated, tapping his tongue against his teeth then made his choice. He took Jesse’s wrist and turned it face up, same as he’d done with his a moment before.
Outside, the clouds covering the moon had begun to roll back, the rain not quite finished but coming close. Enough light for Daniel to see by, even if he couldn’t have told for sure by touch that the same mark, a mirror match of his own, showed dark and true on Jesse’s wrist.
Daniel pressed over the mark with his thumb. “You felt that,” he said against Jesse’s hair as he stroked the faint embossed lines. “I knew you would. And it’ll get better from here on, I promise. You’ll be all right.”
Jesse lifted his head. Up close, his ordinary hazel eyes had sparks of green and gold around the swelling blackness of his pupils. “I don’t understand.”
“It’s okay,” Daniel soothed. “You will. Lean up for a second, let me—” He managed to slip a hand into his hip pocket, where he’d carried the leather case for years. It had more scratches than it had unmarred surface area, but it did the job.
He flicked the catch open with thumb and forefinger and worked the pair of boy’s spectacles out, then let the case fall. “I told you,” he said, sliding the glasses up his nose, not minding how the earpiece caught in his hair and set them askew. “I told you I’d take care of you.”
Jesse frowned. Confusion had drawn his eyebrows together in a severe line that changed his face. He moved his lips as if reading Daniel the way he’d puzzle out a sign on the wall, but he didn’t truly comprehend—Daniel thought—until he’d reached with trembling fingers to settle the glasses straight on Daniel’s nose.
Daniel didn’t need the glasses to see, or to hide behind. He’d replaced the lenses with clear plastic a while back.
He would have been happier if he’d left them as-is. If all he’d been able to see was a blur, he’d have missed the emotions flashing across Jesse’s face. Confusion. Shock. Dismay.
“Daniel. You’re Daniel, not Darren,” Jesse said, the words falling heavy and ugly as pitch and crow feathers. “No. No, no, no.”
Chapter Three
“Jesse—” Daniel started, trying to reach for the man. Impulse, instinct. A rose by any other name, and one that bore more than its share of thorns.
“Don’t.” Jesse jerked away from him, back flat against the stone wall. He pressed one arm to his chest, over his stomach. The left arm. His right arm hung down and away. Not even his subconscious could bear to have the mark one inch closer than it had to be. He licked his lips. His eyes were too wide, barely blinking. “Don’t.”
Daniel stuffed down the ragged edge of frustration and anger. “I told you I’d come for you, Jesse. I told you I’d take care of you.”
“And I—” Jesse bore down hard on his lip, teeth making white dents against the soft flesh. He jerked his pants back up and fastened them with shaking hands. “You shouldn’t have come.”
The sting of that snapped cruel and sharp in Daniel’s chest. “Now where have I heard that before?” he said with a harshness unlike himself, knowing as much but not able to stop. “I want to help you.”
“Then stay away from me. Why couldn’t you just do that one thing, and stay away— ” Jesse dodged Daniel’s outstretched hand. His stumble to the side put him in the open doorway. He nearly tripped over Dog, who rose up with a whine of worry. “Why did you have to—?”
“Because you’re my mate. What else could I do?” Daniel kept his hands to himself. Not easy. “You didn’t seem to mind someone who wasn’t your mate a minute ago.”
Insult met injury and might as well have torn a bloody furrow through Jesse. What little color he had to spare leached from his skin.
“I’m sorry,” Daniel started to say. He didn’t get far. “Don’t run away. Jesse!”
Too late. Jesse turned his back and took off at a gallop. He moved faster than Daniel would have thought him capable of, again. Dog loped at his heels, whining as he ran and looked back at Daniel. He tried to dodge in front of Jesse, who didn’t even seem to notice him. Too hell-bent on getting out of there.
“Jesse,” Daniel shouted after him. “Jesse!”
* * * *
Caught. He knows everything, now. Everything I didn’t want him to ever find out.
The distance between clock tower and tavern was short enough to measure in steps, not yards, but Jesse’s fingers and toes had gone numb by the end of the trek. He couldn’t remember running, though he knew he must have done. Dog pressed his solid weight against Jesse’s legs. For once he didn’t bark or wag his tail. He looked up at Jesse as if expecting an explanation.
“Good luck there,” Jesse told Dog. He could feel the cold as easily as he could sense Daniel not far behind him. Still at the clock tower, he thought, and could have proven it if he’d turned to look over his shoulder.
Dog leaned into Jesse’s hand and whined softly. Jesse scratched the top of that sturdy head. Just as soft and silky as he’d been told. How about that?
But Daniel had had no right. None.
He had every right, a voice whispered in the back of Jesse’s mind. A soulmate’s right.
Jesse blocked his ears, shivered with the cold and dug for the key he knew he must have tucked away, even if he couldn’t remember that, either. His head had gone to pieces. For once Dog didn’t help. He thrust his muzzle, cold and wet, under Jesse’s hand, snuffling and licking at the mark on Jesse’s wrist.
“Stop it, Dog,” Jesse said, shoving him back. “Dog, stop.” There. The right set of keys. Finally. It took him three tries to find the specific key he wanted on the ring and slot it in the lock. Not exactly stealthy, though he hoped the tavern might still be noisy enough to slip under the radar.
As if.
When Jesse finally pushed the door open, he had company. Cade stood where he had been before—in the middle of wrapping fresh-washed silverware in napkins, by the look of it—with one eyebrow cocked at a steep and curious angle. “So,” he started in the devil-may-care way he had that made Jesse want, for one sharp, shining moment, to punch him, “I’m guessing World War III?”
Jesse had heard the Hart and Hound’s back passageways kept the chill of winter halfway through summer. He’d taken their word for it. Now, wet through to the skin with rain and shock, his teeth chattered. “What?”
“The way you battered your way through the door, I figured it had to be either war or hellhounds chasing you in from the outside. Either that, or a tsunami,” Cade said. He bent from the waist to dig in the bin of fresh linens, chose a towel then tossed it down the corridor with an easy overhand throw. “You’re soaked, though I expect you did notice that. Dry off before you catch a cold.”
Jesse caught the towel in his right hand without thinking. He held the fistful of terry upraised, arm in front of his face, knowing his new soulmark was exposed but be damned if he could lower the thing.
Cade’s second eyebrow shot up to join the first in twin, startled arches. “That’s new,” he said. “Normally, I’d go for the congratulations—”
“Don’t,” Jesse said. “Just don’t.”
Dog y
ipped like a puppy and planted both muddy forepaws on Jesse’s chest. He loosed a loud, joyous bark that jarred Jesse’s teeth and made his ears ring. “Dog, I said stop!” He pushed Dog down, not gently, and regretted it in the next second when Dog shot him a deeply wounded look and bolted away, past Cade and into the tavern proper. “Damn it!”
Cade craned to look over his shoulder. “He didn’t go far. Just to the bartender’s station, under the taps. Smart dog.” He turned back to eye Jesse. “Asking if you’re all right would go down as one of the all-time most stupid questions in the world, wouldn’t it?”
Jesse rubbed at his face and didn’t answer.
Cade made a thoughtful sound. He picked up the napery he’d set aside, deftly rolling the serviette together. “Use that towel, would you? Make it worth the price you paid. Though I know you’re not supposed to be back here tonight. Helena said she’d have my head on a platter if I let you sneak in instead of going home to rest when you needed a break.”
Maybe so, but Jesse couldn’t go home. Wouldn’t. All he’d manage there would be, at best, staring at the walls and jumping at the sound of every passing car. If he didn’t have something normal to do he’d lose his mind for good, Jesse swore to God he would.
“I won’t tell if you won’t,” Jesse said shortly. He rubbed at his hair with the towel, soulmark turned in.
“Head. Platter,” Cade repeated, though he frowned as if questioning the edict.
Jesse hoped so, anyway.
“I need to stay on her good side.”
Jesse could wonder why, but he had no room left to care, neither in head or heart. He looked at Cade, trying to find a level with the man. “And?”
“God almighty.” Cade snorted. “You’d stay no matter what, wouldn’t you? Ah, what the hell. Last call’s a good four hours away and if the choice is between you looking like you got back from the wars five minutes ago instead of five or so years, then far be it from me. Knives and forks are here, napkins are there. Knock yourself out. I’ll keep an eye on your furry friend.”