“I can’t hold it back,” he muttered, but I didn’t want him to. I wanted his cum in my mouth, I wanted it trickling down my chin. I wanted him to let go of all that shame with me and just enjoy this. Us.
And it didn’t take long.
A few moments later, I felt Dante’s whole body quake before he let out a grunt, steadying himself against the top of my head as a spurt of cum hit the back of my throat. It tasted salty and sweet, slightly overpowering, making me gasp against it as the second jet filled my mouth. The moment was too much, and I gripped my own cock hard as I shot my load underneath him, stickiness covering my fingers. I pulled his softening cock from my mouth and leaned forward to lick the swollen, red head, making him flinch as his nerve endings were overwhelmed with sensation.
“Jesus,” he moaned, his hands going to the back of my head, his finger running along the back of my neck ever so slightly in a soothing motion.
“You like that?” I smiled up at him, still tasting his orgasm on my lips.
He nodded, looking right at me. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt anything like it.”
AFTER WE’D CALMED DOWN, I persuaded Dante to shower with me. It was nice, and even though nothing sexual happened, just the act of being naked together, washing ourselves in such an intimate space, felt like the perfect end to what had been a first for both of us. For me, it was truly my first of anything, and I was glad it had been with him. He hadn’t pushed me to do more than I was comfortable with. In fact, if anything, it was the opposite, and that couldn’t be underestimated. And for Dante, it had been his first time with another man, though I had to secretly hope it wouldn’t be his last.
I didn’t know where we would go from there, whether he would decide that it should be a one off or whether we would fall into some sort of longer-term arrangement. Friends with benefits, perhaps... Or maybe more. I couldn’t hold back the feeling that I wanted it to be more, to be a relationship, but it had to be his decision in the end. I wasn’t going to pressure him. I didn’t know what was going through Dante’s mind, but I did know that this was a big deal and not something that could or should be influenced by me. And if all he wanted in the end was to stay as friends who had shared something very special together, I told myself that was OK.
But as we lay in bed afterwards, the duvet kicked to the floor as I wrapped myself around him for warmth, I let my mind wander to that one outcome that made me happiest: that we would be together, as a couple. That I might introduce him to my mum, my stepfather and my sister as my boyfriend, rather than my coach.
That there was a future that saw the two of us living in the same house, eating food cooked by him, listening to his awful music CDs or him complaining I was playing too many computer games.
As I slipped off to sleep, I let myself smile over the thought that I might finally have someone to call my own.
I SHIVERED AND ROLLED over, stretching out my arm, expecting to touch Dante’s shoulder, to pull myself into his warmth. Sometime during the night, I must have kicked off the covers, because I was lying naked on top of the bed and I could feel the gooseflesh pimpling over my own shoulders and neck. But I found nothing as I felt for him, and blearily I opened my eyes.
There he was, by the bed, leaning over the bedside table, scribbling on a notepad with curled corners. I took a moment to enjoy the view of him standing there, naked, the way his body caught the subdued morning light, gently defining his toned back, the muscles gripping beneath his shoulders and around his spine. He was truly beautiful. If I’d been an artist, I would have sketched him, but instead I memorised the way he looked to me, intending to write a few lines later when I went home.
If I went home.
After all, we could spend the day together if we wanted to. It wouldn’t hurt to have a day off from my training, especially if we could work on my stamina another way...
“Morning, handsome,” I said with a smile.
But my mood dropped when he turned my way. The look on his face was pained, deep lines between his eyebrows and the skin stretched tight at the corners of his mouth. “Juke... I was going to leave you a note.”
“Leave me a note? Where are you going?”
“I need to go for a run. Look—”
I shook my head. “Forget about running. Come back to bed. Have a cheat day.”
“No, I can’t. Juke, I’ve tried to explain everything to you here.” He pointed at the notepad. “It’s probably best if you...” He trailed off, his eyes leaving mine.
My stomach turned over, confusion and worry mixing in a churning mess inside me. “What’s going on, Dante?”
“Just...read it.” He picked up the notepad and thrust it my way, still not meeting my gaze.
I took it from him, wiping at my face and trying to clear both the blurriness from my eyes and the confusion from my head. As I read his note, my heart sank further and further, until my next words came out with far more venom than I intended. “You want me to leave?”
“It’s for the best.”
“For who? Not for me!”
“Juke, don’t make this hard. You said yourself last night that this was just a moment of fun.”
I shook my head. “No. Don’t put this on me. I said that you could tell me if all you wanted to do was fuck me. You still can, but that’s your decision not mine. You let me stay here overnight. You held me in your arms. I didn’t expect you to just cast me aside and never see me again. We can at least be friends. I can still taste your cum, for fuck’s sake!”
Dante shook his head. “That’s not fair and you know it. We both wanted to have sex.”
“And what’s wrong with that?”
“If we were just friends or acquaintances, absolutely nothing at all. But we’re not. I’m your coach. I shouldn’t have taken advantage of the situation like that.”
I laughed. “That’s what this is all about? You think... what? That you abused your position?”
“Exactly.”
“Don’t be ridiculous! I wanted you from the moment I saw you. This is stupid. Stop worrying and come back to bed.”
Dante reached across to the pile of clothes by his desk and picked up a pair of cotton boxer shorts, and stepped into them. “That’s not going to happen. None of this should have happened. I should never have taken you on as an exclusive client, then maybe I wouldn’t have got so close. None of this is your fault, Juke. If you want to report me, that’s absolutely your right.”
I fell silent, searching for something to say that would diffuse the situation. Did he really think I was going to fling this at him? Report him to his governing body? Was that what he was afraid of?
Then it dawned on me, he was afraid. That was exactly the right word. This was fear. Fear, not of the unknown, but of the known. He was scared of going back to a place he’d been before.
“Did you have an affair with the mother of one of your students?”
He didn’t look at me, but he turned away, freezing in the middle of getting dressed. “You heard about that?”
“You’re not the only one that takes the time to look into new people he’s going to work with. Tell me what happened, Dante, it can’t be that bad.”
“This isn’t the time or the place for that. Just let me go. And don’t be here when I get back. Please.” He grabbed his trainers from by the wardrobe and headed for the bedroom door. I had a few seconds and then he’d be gone.
“Just tell me if it was true. Please. I’ll go. I just need to know.”
Dante hesitated, then nodded. “Of course. You have that right. It wasn’t true. It didn’t matter though. My membership was suspended for a year.” He pulled open the bedroom door, then turned back and finally met my gaze. “Juke, last night wasn’t a mistake. I don’t regret it. And that’s why I have to go and you have to get away from me, because if you don’t I’m scared it will happen again. I can’t be your coach and your lover. It’s unethical. I’ll find someone else to take my place.”
“Dante, don
’t-” He pulled the door closed, and I muttered, “go...”
Chapter 5
One Week Later
“Sure you should be competing?” Neal Hewitt grinned as he punched my arm. Anyone could have mistaken it for a friendly gesture, but I knew it wasn’t. The punch wasn’t gentle. “Don’t want you freaking out in the middle of the pool, do we?”
I stared after him as he headed for the gym with his coach, still laughing at my expense, but Vicki snapped her fingers in front of my face.
“Hey, ignore him. All that matters is that you get out there and show him that you’re back to your old self. Destroy him on the field of battle.” She raised her eyebrows and I nodded.
Puffing out a breath, I focused on her. “You’re right. He’s nothing. All that matters is who comes first.”
“Right. And that’s going to be you. I’ve seen the way you move through the water now, he hasn’t. Hewitt is going to find out the hard way that you’re no pushover.”
Despite her fighting words – or perhaps because of them – I had a tightness in my chest as I thought about the contest. It was my first time competing since the injury and everything that had happened since, and if I didn’t beat Neal I’d lose my ranking. Sponsorship deals were a big part of my income. If I wasn’t a top competitor I’d lose all that.
Vicki Wright had been working with me since the day after Dante quit as my coach. She contacted me, saying that he had asked her to step in to fulfil his commitment to me, and we took it from there. She was a good coach, but things with her were clinical and the truth was I was a few fractions of a second slower now than I had been a week earlier. Without Dante’s hands-on approach, without his insistence on diet, cardio and rest, rather than just working on my swimming technique, I’d fallen back into bad habits.
Of course, none of that was really Vicki’s fault. She couldn’t help the fact that she was taking over with only a few days to get me into shape, nor did she even know that I was nursing a broken heart and all those pizzas and bowls of ice-cream were comfort food. But still, there was no denying the fact I wasn’t in the same shape I had been before she took over.
“We’ve got a couple of hours to kill before you’re up. How do you want to spend it? Definitely need to warm up before you go out there, but I doubt you want to share the gym with Hewitt, so maybe we should take a look at some old recordings and see where we can make improvements first, then head to the gym when that’s done?”
I nodded. “That sounds good. I’m going to nip to the loo before we begin. Meet you in the conference room in five?”
“Sure. See you there.”
I watched her go before heading for the toilets. As soon as I was in there, I went straight to the nearest basin and splashed water on my face, trying to cool the burning sensation that had started in my cheeks as soon as Neal had spoken.
“You’ve got this,” I whispered to my reflection. “Everybody’s expecting a show. They want to see Juke Henderson back to full speed, they want to see the old rivalry start up again. They want to see you win.”
But it was a lie. They didn’t want to see that at all. They wanted to see drama, and what could be more dramatic than Neal Hewitt coming first and sailing back into the top ten?
Or me freaking out and having to be pulled from the pool before I drown?
I shook my head. I couldn’t think about that. It wasn’t going to happen. I was comfortable and relaxed in the water now, the way I’d always been in the past, and I had Dante to thank for that. Whatever else had happened, he’d got me back to where I needed to be.
Fuck. Dante. The thought of him made me wonder what he was doing right now; what he’d been doing since the last time we spoke. I knew I’d been spending a lot of time moping, but had he moved on already? Did he even think about what had happened, or was that old history?
“Pull yourself together, Jukie,” I told myself.
I thought I was alone, but as I stared at myself in the mirror I heard a sniffle, and turned around to see one of the cubicle doors closed. I turned back and splashed my face again, narrowing my eyes at the frightened looking man in the mirror. What would Vicki tell me? I was a competitor. I was going to win. Losing wasn’t an option.
The toilet flushed behind me, and as the cubicle door opened I saw a younger guy come out. I tried to ignore the red rims around his eyes as I watched him in the mirror, the obvious signs that he’d been crying as I waited for him to leave, but when he’d finished washing his hands, instead of heading straight for the door he turned my way.
“Aren’t you Juke Henderson?”
I nodded. “Hi.”
He met my eyes in the mirror. “We swam together last year in Bristol. You probably don’t remember me.”
I didn’t, at first, trying to cast my mind back to the contest he was referring to. There were a few new competitors there, first time qualifiers I didn’t recognise.
He laughed. “It’s OK. James Landry. Jimmy. I’m a bit of a fan boy to be honest. I’ve followed your career since I was a kid.”
God, that made me feel old. As far as I was concerned, he looked like he still was a kid. Was I really one of the old guard?
“No, I do remember you,” I said as the name rang a bell. “You came fifth or sixth. Impressive for a newcomer.”
“Yeah, that’s right. Thanks.”
“Sure. It’s good to see you. Are we competing with each other today?”
“Supposed to be, but I don’t know. I’m not sure this life is really for me. Some people around here are cruel.”
I nodded. “I er... couldn’t help noticing that you were crying. Is everything OK?”
“Apparently people like me shouldn’t be allowed to enter contests for British people.”
“Fuck. Who said that?” I could barely believe that those kinds of attitudes still existed, let alone that someone would have the gall to express them out loud. “They’re out of line, you know that, right?”
He raised an eyebrow, and something in his expression let me know who he was talking about.
“Neal fucking Hewitt, right?” I waited until he nodded, then put a hand on his shoulder. “Seriously, man, that guy has no right, and he certainly doesn’t speak for anyone but himself. I got the same sort of attitude when I started competing, he was just one of a few people who thought guys like me, from the council estates, had no business being at professional level with them. Stick with me, I’ll watch out for you, and I’m with you if you want to take it higher. If I hear anything, I’ll report it.”
“Thanks. I’m still not sure I want to be here, but thanks.”
I nodded. “Do what you’ve got to do. But know that I’ve got your back.”
“Thanks Juke. Or Jukie? Sorry, I couldn’t help hearing you...”
I drew a breath through my nose. “You heard that, huh? Juke is fine, nobody calls me Jukie except my family. And one other person...” I averted my eyes.
“Let me guess, girlfriend?” I turned back and raised an eyebrow, and he nodded. “Boyfriend?”
“I wish I could say yes. It ended kind of badly. But you don’t want to hear about my problems.”
“Hey, it might not mean as much coming from me, but I’m here for you too. I’d like to be friends.” He grinned. “I mean, telling my family that I’m now friends with Juke Henderson? Serious clout.”
I chuckled. “Careful, I might develop an ego. Can I tell you the truth? It goes no further than the two of us?”
“Cross my heart.”
“I slept with my coach, about a week ago. Not Vicki Wright, she took over after that. Have you heard of Nick Dante?” Jimmy shook his head. “Well, he was kind of a big deal back in the day. I had him working with me, but things developed and we ended up in bed. It wasn’t planned by either of us, but it was...” I hesitated, my face going red. “Sorry, too much information?”
“No, but I can fill in the blanks. What happened? How come it ended?”
“He got it in his head that
he should break it off. Unethical, apparently. I mean, there’s a bit of a history there.”
“But he’s not your coach now? So technically there’s no conflict of interest...”
I pursed my lips. “Technically, I guess, but I don’t think Dante would see it that way.” A wry little grin spread over my face before I said the next words: “He’s kind of a tight ass.” Which brought a thought of that ass right into my head. “Anyway, you asked what happened. That’s the story. I wish things weren’t the way they are, but it’s not really in my power to change that.”
He nodded, happy that that was the end of the story, but in my heart I wondered if that was the truth. What Jimmy had said was right; Dante wasn’t my coach any more. There was no conflict of interest. So why didn’t I call him? I still had his number. I could call and say hello, find out how he was doing, so what was stopping me?
Fear.
The truth was, I was afraid of going back there. I was afraid of giving him another chance to break my heart all over again. If he did, I didn’t know how I would get over it.
I met Jimmy’s eyes in the mirror. “It’s good to meet you. Tell your family we’re friends.”
He grinned. “Thanks, man. See you in the pool?”
“Sure will.”
With that, I headed for the door and out into the lobby, where I should have turned left to go to the conference room and Vicki. But instead I headed right.
Toward the gym.
“WHAT THE FUCK, NEAL?”
He grinned as he carried on jogging on the machine, not an ounce of shame. “So what? If he can’t take a joke, he’s not going to survive a day, let alone a lifetime. In a way, I’ve done him a favour. He doesn’t have what it takes.”
“So you don’t deny it?”
“Why should I deny it? British contests should be for Brits.”
“And they are.”
“So why is he competing?”
I growled as I stood there, unable to fathom why his coach wasn’t stepping in right now. Surely someone connected to Neal Hewitt had a backbone? “I’m going to take this higher. Don’t think I won’t. Enjoy the points deduction.”
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