Shades of Henry (The Flophouse Book 1)

by Amy Lane

  “Well, you don’t need to sound so shocked,” Henry muttered. “I mean, it wasn’t functional or public, but Mal and I managed to keep a major secret for eleven years. We had to have some skills.”

  Lance was suddenly sober, and he searched Henry’s eyes with his own. “Do you think about it like that?” he asked. “Like a relationship?”

  Henry stood up suddenly, moving to put the leftover veggie simmer into a reusable Ziploc bag. He’d originally looked for butter-ware or leftover sour cream containers, but it turned out, nobody in this house ate anything with that much fat in it.

  Ever.

  He made himself busy in the kitchen in silence, knowing Lance was watching him through troubled eyes.

  “No,” he said at last. “I… I thought it was. I… I mean, we were together, right? There was this one time—right after we got through basic training, hand-to-hand and weapons combat—where we went on leave and Mal dragged me to this cheap hotel that…. God. I went and bought sheets for it, because we were going to be there a week but we couldn’t afford anything better.” He felt a grimace pass over his features. “Mal and Debbie were saving up for off-base housing.”

  Lance made a… well, not a sound, exactly. More like a breath. A long, slow breath out from his nose.

  “Anyway,” Henry continued, not sure what to do with that… breath, “we’d gotten the hard bang out of our system, and I said, ‘Hey, why don’t we go out to the bar and get some drinks or something,’ and he said we weren’t leaving the hotel room. And I sort of laughed him off. I showered and got dressed and was about to leave when he….” Henry’s hands started to shake. He wasn’t sure where this memory had come from or why it had chosen tonight to slip out. It was a long time ago, right? It’s not like Malachi had meant it.

  Right?

  “What’d he do?” Lance asked, and Henry glanced up to see his eyes tracking Henry’s movements as he played Captain Domesticity in a way that would have made his father sneer. Well, his father never had to care for a bunch of broke students/porn models who needed to save everything from half sandwiches to grilled chicken breasts if they wanted to have enough food to eat all month. And then, apparently, to throw it up.

  “As I was heading for the door, he grabbed me around the throat and sliced my dress shirt off, from the back of the neck down. I’d put on a nice one—one of two I had, actually—and he caught some skin. I probably still have the scar. He let me go, and I was standing there, blood trickling down my neck, shirt in pieces and falling down my arms, and he put the blade away and threw himself back on the bed. I just… stared at him. He said—I’ll never forget this—’You ain’t going out there to find no one else, Henry. Just give that up right there.’”

  “Henry—”

  Henry shook him off. “Anyway, we worked really hard to keep the relationship a secret. That’s where our… our partner skills were, you know? How to get laid without anybody knowing we were getting laid.” Lance took another deep breath, and Henry couldn’t look at him. “Man, you’ve got to eat some of that. I feel like I put you off your food—”

  “That’s not your fault,” Lance whispered.

  “Yeah, I know. But I’m the one who had to dredge up the weird shit right when I was trying to focus on you. So, another bite? Please? So I don’t feel like—”

  “I’ll eat tomorrow,” Lance said. “Right now, I’ll throw it up, and not voluntarily. Henry. Are you even listening to yourself?”

  “Yeah.” Henry set the saucepan in the sink. “I am. I….” Damn. This had been such a good day too. In all of those pictures, that amazing slideshow behind his eyes, he hadn’t seen Malachi’s face once.

  Not once.

  Lance, the guys, Davy and his family, Galen and John—even Jackson Rivers and Ellery Cramer—all of them figured so much larger in his life now.

  He’d forgotten he came from this.

  “I hadn’t realized how psychotic that was,” he said weakly, leaning against the sink. “I thought, ‘Oh. That’s how guys have relationships.’ But… but it’s not Davy and Carlos. It’s not John and Galen or Rivers and Cramer. It’s not….” He swallowed. “It’s not you and me.”

  Lance stood and leaned over his back. “It hasn’t been yet,” Lance murmured in his ear. “And it won’t be, ever.”

  Henry nodded and let Lance hold him. “This night was supposed to go different,” he said, disconsolately. “I was supposed to tell you about taking criminal justice classes, tell you about my day, and you were supposed to tell me about what it’s like to work in a hospital when you’re not hiding in the bathroom waiting for your suspects to stop banging, and you were supposed to eat and then we were going to… to… to….”

  “Make love,” Lance whispered in his ear.

  “Yes.” Henry took the two arms wrapped around his shoulders and clung to them. “I… eleven years of thinking I knew what fucking men was all about, and I didn’t know men even could make love.”

  Lance emitted a cracked laugh. “Do you think you’re the only one? I’m supposed to be a professional here. I had it so locked down. Why did I need a real boyfriend? I could miss all the chances I wanted, have all the hookups I needed, because I fucked on camera and it’s all physical anyway.”

  Henry squeezed his eyes closed tight. “It’s not.”

  “No. Not you. Never has been.”

  Just enough weight lifted off Henry’s chest that he could breathe again. “Good. What do we do now?”

  Lance nuzzled his ear. “I take you to bed, and we make love. And maybe we talk some more, and maybe we fall asleep. And when we wake up tomorrow, we do it all over again, and try to work on ourselves so we’re better humans going to sleep each night than we were when we woke up. It’s the only choice we’ve got.”

  “Jackson says this should end tomorrow.” Henry turned in his arms. “He says either the cops will arrest me or we’ll find the key piece of evidence that will turn the tide. So tomorrow night, I come home—”

  Lance grimaced. “And I’m working and probably catching a nap in the crib.”

  Henry rolled his eyes. “Okay. So you come home the day after tomorrow, and you’re exhausted and I’m here because it’s the weekend and I’ve got nothing to do. What happens?”

  Again, that searching glance. “We talk some more?”

  Henry nodded. “It’s your turn to do the talking,” he said. “Because I feel naked in front of you already.”

  Lance let out a sigh. “Fair enough.” His mouth crumpled. “Can we start the lovemaking, though? Please?”

  Henry couldn’t think anymore. Couldn’t talk. He closed his eyes and lifted his face for a kiss, expecting it to be sad and shy after their conversation that night.

  But Lance’s mouth was hot and eager, and desire roared through Henry’s body, burning away his inhibitions, his reservations—and seemingly his clothes, because one minute he was fully dressed in the kitchen, then in a flurry of having Lance’s hot mouth on his and his impatient, grabby hands all over him, the two of them were naked and Lance had steered him toward the couch.

  “There’s lube under the cushions,” Lance murmured in his ear. “And condoms.”

  Henry turned and fell to his knees on the floor, scrambling under the cushions. “I should get tested,” he muttered. “I’m on PrEP, but I haven’t been since… since….”

  Lance’s bare body over his own stilled his fumbling tongue. His fingers, however, were still active, and he produced the condoms and lubricant with an air of exasperated triumph.

  “Who’s been having sex on the couch?” he asked as Lance ran his lips down the back of his neck. “Besides us, I mean.”

  Lance chuckled softly, his breath hot and gentle on the curve of Henry’s ear. “We’re the only ones we need to worry about tonight,” he murmured. “Me on top, you on bottom?”

  Henry made a “Mm…” sound. “Only way I know how to do it,” he admitted, in case Lance had “Henry the caveman” fantasies.

 
“We can fix that,” Lance murmured. “I love to bottom.”

  Henry turned and caught his mouth, getting lost in the kiss again. “No new skills tonight,” he mumbled. “Everybody plays to their strengths.”

  “Trust me,” Lance told him, a wicked grin stealing across his features. “I… God, Henry. I want you so bad.”

  Henry shuddered and allowed himself to be helped onto the couch on his back, one foot on the ground and one knee propped up. He turned to Lance with wide, skeptical eyes. “You gonna feed me grapes?” he asked, but then he saw what Lance was doing.

  Lance’s head was resting on the side of the couch near Henry’s hip, and his hand was behind his back and he was… he was….

  He moaned slightly and then pulled his hand forward, wiping it off on the T-shirt one of them had left on the floor. The eyes he turned toward Henry were wide and glazed, and Henry realized Lance had been stretching his own asshole with lubricated fingers, and gasped.

  His cock throbbed against his stomach, and he closed his eyes, only to open them again when Lance’s mouth—God, so fucking hot—closed over him.

  “Ahhhh….”

  Lance’s mouth engulfed him again, and Henry turned and bit his upper arm to keep from crying out. “I’m… oh wow. Buddy, I’m gonna come if you do that much longer.”

  Lance pulled back and gazed at his face through passion-blown pupils. “Someday. Someday, it’s going to be my mouth on your cock, all day long. Nothing but dick. But not tonight.”

  Henry let out a stuttered breath. “You do talk sweet.”

  Lance gave a strained chuckle and snagged the condom from next to Henry, then ripped through the foil before slipping it over Henry’s cock with practiced ease. Henry swallowed and stroked himself through the thin polyisoprene. “That’s different,” he murmured. “I don’t usually wear one of these.” Because usually it was him, hoping Mal had brought the lubricated ones this time.

  “Yeah?” Lance stood and swung his leg around, straddling Henry. “Wait until you see this!” For just a moment there was the heady knowledge of his nakedness up against Henry’s groin, bare skin to bare skin, and Henry stared at him, wondering exactly how this was going to work.

  And then Lance positioned Henry’s cock right at his own entrance, and the lightbulb that had been waiting to go off in Henry’s head exploded.

  “Oh! My God!”

  Lance’s smile was dreamy, pure sex. “Omigod. Omigod omigod omigod….” He gasped as Henry’s cockhead stretched through his opening, and then suddenly Henry was inside him, and… oh Christ. Henry had to close his eyes against the orgasm that battered at his balls.

  “I’m fucking you?” he asked in surprise, arching his hips up slowly and finishing the last few inches himself.

  “That would be great, thank you,” Lance said in a strained voice.

  Henry grabbed Lance’s hips, the flesh smooth and thick under his fingers and palms, and held him. He knew how this was supposed to work—just because he’d spent most of his sex time bent over something or on all fours didn’t mean he didn’t get the mechanics.

  And Lance wasn’t bent over, his ass out in supplication. He was facing Henry, his hands kneading Henry’s chest, his beautiful face tipped up so Henry could see pleasure washing over it. Henry clenched his stomach and released, thrusting up and pulling back gently, easily, giving pleasure instead of only taking it.

  Oh wow. Wow. Was this what sex was? Was it supposed to be this gorgeous?

  Lance’s cock, erect and straining, splatted against Henry’s stomach and he got a good look at it for the first time.

  “Oh, man!” Henry released Lance’s hip to stroke it, to revel in the feel of it in his palm again, to pull back the foreskin and yearn to taste. He was good at the blowjob—he’d had to be because Mal didn’t do patience—but he’d never really wanted to savor giving one. His memories of blowjobs were more “Mal’s too tired to put a condom on, so Henry, c’mere and suck this thing, ’kay?” It was how he’d gotten so good at them—he’d been tired too.

  But not now. Now he wanted this thing, this lovely column of flesh, in his mouth. He squeezed, and Lance’s asshole tightened on his cock. Henry moaned and stroked some more, trying to find a rhythm between his hips and his hand. Lance gave a strained chuckle and wrapped his fingers around Henry’s.

  “Let me help,” he whispered. “This sort of thing takes practice.”

  Henry closed his eyes against the burning behind them. “It’s so good. So much better….” Than I ever knew it could be.

  Lance let go of his hand and leaned over, and Henry did his best crunchie to meet him halfway. Their mouths met while their bodies were merged, and Henry moaned throatily. God, this was different. It was sex, but with all the beauty, the mystery that he’d always imagined it could have, and none of the dismissive shame of “just fooling around.”

  There was no “fooling around” about having his body inside his lover’s. Unconsciously he quickened his pace, letting go of Lance’s cock and grabbing his hips again.

  He needed, needed so bad, so hard, he’d die if he didn’t… oh God…. “Lance?” He wasn’t sure he could do this.

  “Don’t stop!” Lance commanded, and Henry watched Lance stroking himself in a blur. Suddenly Lance’s hand slowed, tightened, even as Henry’s hips continued their relentless pace, and whiteness of semen exploded from the tip of his dick.

  The visual threw Henry over, and he closed his eyes and lost himself, his orgasm sweeping from his toes upward. He clenched and cried out, coming into the condom, surrounded by heat, by pressure, by….

  Love?

  He made a sound low in his throat, not wanting to confront the scary word, not yet. Lance slumped over his chest, and Henry wrapped his arms around his shoulders, holding him, just holding him, while he all but purred.

  “Damn, soldier.”

  “Yeah?” he asked. “We do okay?” His voice was more broken than he wanted to admit, and he cursed himself when Lance pulled back and caught his eyes.

  “We did great,” Lance whispered, rubbing his thumb along Henry’s cheek. It came back wet.

  Henry closed his eyes and said, “I don’t usually do that. I swear, I’m not some sort of pansy-assed—”

  Lance’s finger, salty with brine, touched his mouth, and he stilled. “You’ve done a lot of growing, soldier boy. Growing pains hurt. Nothing wrong with that.”

  Henry nodded, eyes still closed. “That was really wonderful,” he said. “I don’t want to ruin it.”

  “Good.” Lance moved off him, and Henry missed his warmth already. Fumbling, he reached down to take care of the condom, only to find Lance’s fingers there first. Lance pulled it off and walked, shamelessly naked, to the bathroom, then came back with a washcloth. He was, Henry saw, smiling, wiping lube out of his ass as he walked.

  It was the only awkward thing Henry had ever seen him do.

  Lance gave a sheepish little smile as he neared the couch, and then bent down and started to wipe Henry off. “I’d clean you off with my mouth,” he apologized, “but I really hate the taste the condom leaves.”

  Henry stroked his hair back. “I’ll get tested,” he said. “I….” He frowned. “I don’t know why Mal always wore rubbers, but he didn’t that last time. I mean, me and, well, his wife….” He cringed. God, he was a scumbag. “But he usually did and—”

  Lance was doing that searching thing with his eyes again, and Henry wondered what he’d missed.

  And then it hit him. “Oh.”

  Lance twisted his lips. “I’m sorry, Henry.”

  Henry took a deep breath and was… surprised… when it didn’t hurt like he thought it would. Apparently being “guys just fooling around” meant Mal hadn’t been faithful to Henry either. Well, that figured, right?

  “It’s not like he ever loved me anyway,” Henry said, cupping Lance’s cheek. “It’s not like it was real.” Eleven years of his life, wasted on a man he’d assumed had at least cared.

&
nbsp; “This is,” Lance told him, capturing his hand. “This is very real, to me at least. You will hurt me if you don’t care for me.”

  Henry nodded, his throat tight, eyes still leaking annoyingly. “I don’t ever want to hurt you,” he said. “I… don’t ever want you to feel like I didn’t care.”

  “Oh, baby….” Lance bit his lip, and Henry had to say it, had to finish the thought, because that way he’d be clean, purged of the last bit of hurt, of hope, of misery that the last eleven years had given him.

  “He never cared for me, did he?”

  Lance shook his head. “No. I’m so sorry.”

  “But you do. And you’re so much more than he ever was.”

  But that didn’t stop them, the sobs that had been blocked up for too long—maybe since he’d stood as Mal’s best man, watching as his lover married his sister—tore out of his throat, and he fell apart against Lance’s chest.

  And trusted that Lance would catch the pieces, so he could put himself back together again.

  New Horizons

  LANCE HAD been running all day. A six-car pileup on I-5 had all hands on deck in the ER, and with the impact of airbags on fragile chest cavities, a cardiac specialist was in high demand. He got another call about a possible heart attack during a shoot-out and hit the ambulance bay just in time to see Henry’s new hero wheeled out on a stretcher, a tall, dark-haired man with a sharp nose and angular chin getting out behind him.

  “Rivers?” Lance said in surprise, and found himself pushed aside by two ICU nurses who were chastising the patient.

  “Really, Jackson?” said Dave, the tall nurse with dark freckles on pale brown skin. “Really? You invite us to a party next week and now you’re gonna die on us?”

  “As. If.” Jackson was talking through an oxygen mask, but his irritation was quite clear. “See my shark in a suit? He’s gonna bitch me back to health.”

  “Yeah,” said Alex, Dave’s boyfriend and thirty-five-year-old twinkie. “But he’s getting tired. Jesus, Rivers, give the poor guy a break!”