Chapter Eleven
Alexei was still having a hard time believing his eyes. What was right in front of him.
He knelt, his bare knees framing Mike’s jean-covered legs. He couldn’t seem to stop touching Mike’s face. Kissing him gently. Licking into Mike’s mouth before dancing their tongues from one mouth to another. Mike never tried to take control. He just…followed.
Which was all the more remarkable, and sweet, because Alexei knew he could stop and toss out any number of topics that got Mike’s back up, and his friend would argue with him until he was blue in the face.
Alexei had the sinking suspicion that he was an idiot. He’d always been attracted to a particular kind of man. He admired strength and toughness, both physical and mental. Traits he found frequently among hockey players—often to his dismay. And from these men he’d sought out lovers who were not just submissive in the bedroom, but who’d been willing to carry that submission over to all other aspects of their relationship—until they couldn’t do it anymore and left.
Now, looking down into Mike’s flushed face, he felt incredibly stupid. Mike waited quietly for Alexei. No doubt eager to do whatever Alexei asked—just as Alexei had always wanted in a lover. And when they were done, they would argue about dinner. Or who should do the laundry. Or whether or not Alexei should have let that goal in the second period get past him.
And that, Alexei realized with a terrifying mixture of shock and excitement, was what he really wanted.
What, apparently, Mike wanted too. Alexei took in how Mike’s hair stood on end from Alexei’s fingers. His eyes bright with arousal. He’d never looked more handsome. Or so debauched. Alexei glanced down at the rigid line of Mike’s erection straining against his jeans.
“Does that hurt?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you adjust yourself?” Alexei wouldn’t have been able to resist freeing his dick and probably jerking off by now, had the situation been reversed.
“You didn’t tell me to.” He said it like it was obvious, with just a hint of sass in his smirk.
Alexei smiled. Kissed him again. Longer and harder this time.
“Come to the bedroom,” Alexei said, rising to his feet. He reached down to take Mike’s hand and helped him to stand.
Alexei had only been on his knees for a few minutes and they ached. Mike didn’t so much as wince.
Alexei’s heart beat so hard, it felt like it was banging against his ribs. That was probably why he couldn’t draw a deep breath when he looked at Mike. Why his chest ached.
He laced their fingers together, led Mike down the hall to his bedroom, and stopped just inside the door. He’d never brought another man here before. And he was glad.
“Take off your clothes,” he said as he released Mike’s hand and walked farther into the room.
He heard the sound of fabric rustling behind him and smiled.
“Go lie down on the bed.”
Mike slid past him and was halfway onto the tall king mattress before Alexei recalled the other night and Mike’s shameless presentation of his ass in the air. His cock twitched and his smile grew.
“On your back, Michael.”
Mike paused in the process of planting his face against the mattress and flipped onto his back.
Alexei sat on the edge of the mattress. “We won’t fuck tonight,” he said, mindful of Mike’s inexperience. If Alexei had known then what he knew now—
“We won’t?” Rather than reassured, Mike appeared to be disappointed.
“You’re probably sore.”
Mike smiled. “I am. A little.”
“Then we will find other entertainments,” Alexei promised, his mind pretty much reeling through the possibilities like an X-rated slide show.
He was yanked back to reality when a hand landed on his arm. He blinked, then stared down at Mike, momentarily shocked again to see the gorgeous defenseman stretched out across his bed.
Mike said, “We can do whatever you want,” but then he seemed to hesitate.
Alexei was instantly wary. “I like to be in charge, Mike, not an asshole. Tell me what’s on your mind.”
“I like being sore.”
Some men hated it, but Alexei couldn’t pretend to be anything but delighted that Mike wasn’t one of them. His adults-only slide show was getting longer by the second.
Mike’s eyebrows drew down, and his color edged toward pink. Embarrassed?
Alexei gripped his arm. “The truth, Michael.”
“I like fucking when I’m sore.”
Alexei battled a fresh surge of lust trying to cripple his higher brain function. “I don’t understand. You said I was your first.”
“You are.”
“Then explain.”
“When I would play, you know, by myself, I liked it when I was already sore.” With every word Mike spoke, he turned a shade pinker, but he didn’t falter. “I’d think about you, and what it would be like to feel you like that, and I liked it better—”
Alexei pressed an unsteady finger to Mike’s lips, silencing him. “Did you really think of me? When you fucked yourself?”
Mike didn’t look away. “Yes.”
“With that monster in your drawer?”
“Yes. Sometimes.”
“I’m not that big, Michael.”
Mike’s cheeks glowed red. “No, but you’re better.”
“How?”
“Alive. Warm.” His lips quirked. “You move of your own volition.”
Alexei chuckled. “I see your point.” He ran a hand down Mike’s chest and tried not to laugh out right at how his knees bent and spread the closer Alexei’s hand came to his cock. He gripped the hard shaft in his hand and Mike planted his feet wide on the bed. “This feel more warm and alive than your own hand?”
“No,” Mike admitted with a quick inhale and a wobbly smile. “Just…better.”
Alexei stroked the smooth length once, then slid his hand between Mike’s legs. His knees fell open onto the mattress.
So damn flexible.
Mike flinched when the pad of one finger stroked across the tender hole in question. Alexei forced himself not to think too long about how tight and hot it had been. Just because Mike said he liked it, didn’t mean Alexei was going to leap on the damn man.
“Sore, huh?”
“Yes.” A bead of pre-come dripped from the head of Mike’s cock onto his stomach.
Jesus. Alexei pressed harder. Mike squirmed, his eyes wide and unfocused.
Alexei stilled. “Michael, if I do something you don’t like, you have to tell me.”
“Okay,” Mike said in a hoarse voice, his ass twitching against Alexei’s hand. “Do I need a special word or something?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No. That’s your special word. It’s very simple with me. If you say no, I stop. If you say stop, I stop. If you have questions, ask them and we won’t go on until they’re answered.”
Mike blinked, his vague gaze clearing. “I—Okay. That’s good.”
Alexei smiled, pleased and reassured that they both understood the ground rules. Then he looked down to where his fingers pressed against the still slightly red and swollen ring of Michael’s anus. It wasn’t too bad, but it also didn’t look comfortable—and Mike clearly loved it that way.
Something snapped in Alexei. Some thin tether he’d still clutched, grounded in the disbelief that Michael could truly want what Alexei wanted and still be his stubborn, hard-headed best friend.
He dug the tips of his fingers against the hot flesh ringing Michael’s entrance and smiled when his friend gasped and arched against the bed.
“Get on your knees.”
Michael did it so fast that Alexei wasn’t certain he hadn’t levitated.
His eyes never left Michael’s beautiful ass, tilted up to his view above the long stretch of Mike’s back. Alexei reached for a condom and the lube from the bedside table. Mike shivered at the sound of the foil pac
ket tearing. Whimpered when the bottle made a rude sound. Alexei thought someday he might torture Mike like this for a while, just with sounds and his shifting weight on the mattress.
Mike was so beautifully responsive. Completely without guile. It was more than a little terrifying. And totally fucking hot.
“Grab the headboard.”
Shoulders and neck muscles bulging, ribs expanding with every pant, Michael clamped onto the headboard, spread his knees, and held himself there.
Waiting for Alexei.
Alexei gave into his long-suppressed desire and planted his teeth against the soft curve of Michael’s ass.
He bit his lover. Hard.
A grunt tore from Michael’s throat, his body jerked, and one arm disappeared beneath his chest. Alexei pinched the perfect flesh between his teeth—an even sharper nip that elicited a loud yelp—then sat up.
He slid his hand between Michael’s legs and over the fist clutching the base of Michael’s shaft.
“You let go of the headboard.”
“Sorry,” Michael gasped. “Was going to come.”
Alexei thought it was probably good that Michael couldn’t see his grin. Or his hand swinging to connect with his ass, right over the blooming red bite mark.
Michael jerked, his knuckles going white.
Alexei would have spanked him again, but he was starting to fear Michael might rip his junk right off rather than betray Alexei’s command.
Now Alexei had to grab his dick to wrestle his own orgasm back.
His hand came away covered in lube, and he drew it down the crease of Michael’s ass. He didn’t hesitate to thrust one finger past tender, red flesh and into Michael’s body.
His lover shuddered. “God, Alexei. That feels so fucking good.”
Mike thought he probably ought to be embarrassed at the way Alexei was making him carry on, but he couldn’t stop. His aching muscles clung to the slow drag of Alexei’s finger, unable to relax. His skin achingly sensitive to Alexei’s every movement. Every touch.
Alexei slid a second finger in next to his first, this one loaded with lube. He pressed against stinging skin, eliciting an endless string of hisses and grunts. Mike’s eyes swam with unshed tears. His hands trembled where they gripped the bed and his own dick.
It was so good. Way better than anything he’d ever been able to shove up his own ass.
Alexei’s lips skimmed over the base of Mike’s spine and he groaned, biting his lips to keep from blurting out what he was feeling. Not in his ass, which was fucking spectacular. But in his head. His heart.
Then Alexei’s fingers were gone. Mike looked back, over his shoulder, and barely saved himself from an undignified face-plant by gripping the headboard with both hands again.
Alexei ran a hand up and down Mike’s back, soothing him, until a palm dug into the stinging bite mark on his ass. A smile hovered on Alexei’s lips as he reached for the lube. He didn’t pause, or hesitate, or warn Mike in any way before spreading his ass open and pouring a ton of the stuff into him.
Mike gasped. “Now I know why you buy it by the gallon.”
Alexei laughed. “That cheap shit is only for pranks. I would never risk your comfort with that, Michael.”
God, he loved the sound of his name on Alexei’s lips. How Alexei switched to calling him Michael only when they were like this.
Then Alexei was there, his cock pressing against the screaming muscles and fiery skin of Mike’s ass, and he no longer could have told anyone his own name, let alone what anyone else called him. He gripped the headboard so hard his fingers ached, tilted his ass higher, and closed his eyes.
The burn. The stretch. It was magnificent. The moment of exquisite pain and pleasure when the wide head popped inside. The slick glide of thick shaft easing deeper and deeper into his body with each small thrust.
Mike was lost to the fire and ecstasy storming through him.
He moaned, acutely aware of the soft skin of Alexei’s belly as it came to rest against his ass. He thought he could feel every tiny hair brush against the bite mark and where his ass still glowed from Alexei’s spank.
He only wished Alexei had spanked him more. Harder. So he could feel more.
“You okay?” Alexei’s voice was low and rough, his hands gentle as he rubbed Mike’s spine.
“Yes.”
“You sure?” A finger traced the muscles stretched around Alexei’s cock.
Mike shivered, clamping down around Alexei’s shaft and making the burn a hundred times worse. And better.
“Yes. It feels good. You feel good. Now, please, please, please would you fuck me?”
Alexei’s chuckle lulled him, then two strong fingers pinched the skin still throbbing from the bite.
Mike yelped and jerked back hard, shifting Alexei inside him. Fuck. He threw back his head and slammed his eyes shut, choking on his need to scream and beg for more.
Alexei wrapped his arms around Mike’s chest, and Mike strained to hold both of their weight above the bed. Soft lips brushed his ear, but said nothing.
Alexei ground his cock into Mike’s ass and slowly rolled his hips, jamming his rock-hard shaft against aching walls and burning muscles.
“How’s that?”
“Good,” Mike gasped, beyond the ability to string two words together.
Alexei ground harder. “And that?”
“Amazing.”
“Not too much?”
“No.” God, no. He wanted more. He wanted whatever the hell Alexei could dish out.
Which, it turned out, was a whole hell of a lot.
Alexei lifted off of Mike’s back and wrapped his hands around Mike’s waist. Mike held his breath and prayed to god that he would be able to hold out for more than three thrusts before breaking his promise to Alexei and blowing all over the sheets.
Alexei withdrew slowly, each excruciating inch singing along Mike’s fluttering muscles, the lube easing the friction but not nearly enough to erase the sting. Thank god.
Then Alexei threw himself forward, penetrating Mike to the hilt, the thick base of his shaft stretching Mike wider. Better.
Mike howled his approval.
He clung to the headboard with all his might while Alexei fucked him hard and deep, relentlessly. His arms burned. Shook. He was making an absolute racket and he didn’t give a shit. They had no neighbors and if Alexei was going to fuck him like this on a regular basis—please god—they probably should never get any.
Mike’s throat burned but he couldn’t stop shouting Alexei’s name. And good. And yes. And harder. And more.
“More?” Alexei asked, breathless and fierce, not slowing his thrusts.
“Yes. God, fuck, yes.”
Mike didn’t know what the hell more could possibly be.
“Fuuuck!”
More was Alexei shoving a thick finger into Mike’s ass alongside his cock.
Then a second finger.
And a third.
The searing stretch wrenched a constant bellow of joy from Mike. He felt raw. Open. Defenseless.
Happy.
Alexei twisted his hand and three soft finger pads strummed over Mike’s sweet spot.
Mid-scream, Mike went dead silent, his mouth open in a silent roar, his eyes screwed shut, leaking tears.
“Come now, Michael.”
Honest to god, Mike didn’t just come. He came unglued.
Chapter Twelve
By the time of the Ice Cats reached the division finals two months later, there were very few places on Mike’s body that weren’t sore. Playoff hockey, at any level, was brutal, and there had been no exceptions this year. Mike had been slammed to the boards so many times, he felt like one big bruise.
And then there were the good hurts. The ones from Alexei.
He could feel two fresh bruises on his ass. Alexei hadn’t been kidding. He couldn’t stop biting him. There had been an awkward moment in the locker room after the first time, for which Mike was still getting a ton of shit from
the guys. He’d since perfected the art of keeping his ass covered almost all the time, and Alexei had learned to tuck his nips lower, in the crease between his ass and thigh, or better yet, higher, in the tender flesh of his thigh just behind his balls.
Alexei had once suggested he stop leaving marks for the rest of the post-season, but Mike had successfully talked him out of it.
Thank god.
Mike shifted against his hard chair and used the unexpectedly fancy restaurant’s linen napkin to mask the small, delighted twitch of his lips. He thought anyone in the room should be able to look at him and know. They would see the wince, the smile, the way he fidgeted on his seat, and recognize a well-fucked, happy man.
Except, of course, for his clueless parents sitting right across the table from him. Beside him, Jayne kept sending him questioning glances, but Mike was entirely confident his family would go on seeing only what they wanted to see. Believing only what they wanted to believe.
He didn’t care so much. Not anymore. His life was in Moncton, and this visit was just a quick meal after their game that night. He was glad his family had come to watch them win, was happy to catch up about aunts and uncles and cousins and neighbors. And he would be perfectly content when, come morning, his parents got in their car and headed for home.
Jayne was staying a little longer, and Mike was thinking, just maybe, he could tell her about—
“Mike, did you hear? Kevin Miller is getting married this summer,” his mother announced.
Jayne rolled her eyes and Mike fought the urge to join her. “Good for him.”
“Beatrice—you remember his mother?—is so pleased. He found a lovely girl. They’re already talking about having children.”
Of course they are. He had to look away from Jayne’s sympathetic look, leaving him with the choice of looking at his plate or his mother. His asparagus looked delicious. “That’s great.”
“And Cassidy, down the street? She just had her third child. Those kids are running their grandparents ragged,” his mother said with blatant envy.
Mike smiled wanly and wondered how many times he was going to repeat the words, “That’s great.”
She continued on, completely oblivious, as usual, to her son’s mood and the dozen more times he offered his stock, monotone answer. Babies. Weddings. His mother was obsessed. And about as subtle as a brick.
Crashing the Net Page 10