by Sidney Bell
“Do you even play guitar?” Tobias asked him during a lull.
“No. Why?”
“No reason.” Tobias smiled and Sullivan shook his head. Tobias asked the weirdest questions sometimes. But he also gestured for Sullivan to tell him more, so Sullivan figured he could put up with it.
Later, while Cindy and her friends dined on the restaurant patio, they somehow got onto the subject of guilty pleasure tasks.
“You stress bake,” Sullivan repeated. “For fun, you stress bake.”
“Yes.”
“What does stress baking mean?”
Tobias pulled out another bottle of water and shoved it at Sullivan. “It means I bake when I’m stressed, what do you think it means?”
“I don’t know.” Sullivan wasn’t thirsty, but he felt somehow unhappy at the idea of rejecting the offering. He decided not to think about why that could be and immediately began pulling the label off with his thumbnail. “I thought maybe it was like you have to produce a certain number of cupcakes in an hour or they blow up your pans or something.”
Tobias laughed. “No. It takes a lot of concentration, so I can’t worry about other things, but it’s not high pressure in and of itself. It says a lot about you that you thought there might be something dangerous in it, you know.”
“Hey, cherry pie done right is very dangerous.”
“For the waistline, maybe.”
“In every way. Come on, that’s a sexy pie. If apple pie’s the good girl, cherry pie’s the filthy minx.”
Tobias laughed again, and when they left Cindy tucked in for the night, they ended up at a twenty-four-hour grocery store shopping for baking ingredients.
Which was how they ended up covered in flour at three in the morning, eating steaming cherry pie out of the tin. Sullivan had enjoyed helping—if you could call snitching cherries and flicking sugar at Tobias’s face helping—almost as much as he enjoyed the pie itself. The pastry was golden and flaky and buttery, the filling the perfect mixture of sweet and tart. Sullivan ate three pieces before he collapsed onto the counter, too full to move.
Tobias smirked, drawing a film of plastic wrap over the pie to keep it fresh. “You could’ve stopped at one piece.”
“She seduced me,” Sullivan moaned. God, he was going to explode, and he wasn’t sure it wouldn’t be worth it.
“Come on, get up.” Tobias tugged on his arm. “Let’s clean up. I’m so tired.”
“You made a mess of my kitchen.” Sullivan turned his wrist over so he could trail a thumb over a smear of flour on Tobias’s hand. “And you’re not in much better shape.”
“That’s what happens when someone bakes something for someone.”
Sullivan stood up straight, struck dumb by the flutter of warmth in his chest at Tobias’s words. “Did you bake it for me? Or did you just bake it?”
Tobias’s cheeks flared crimson. “I prefer konparèt.”
“I have no idea what that is,” Sullivan murmured.
“It’s Haitian,” Tobias said, staring at his mouth. It was the middle of the night and they were both riding a mixture of exhaustion and sugar high, and Sullivan maybe wasn’t thinking straight. He could decide if those were good excuses or not tomorrow. Now, he simply gave in to the urge to press a ripe-cherry-red kiss to Tobias’s mouth, tentative and slow, little more than a brushing of lips. Tobias kissed him back instantly, angling his body so that their chests brushed and that was good. Sullivan leaned back against the counter, his hands finding Tobias’s hips, tugging him closer, and that was even better. They kissed for what seemed like hours, slow, thorough, drugging kisses, the need less like a fury and more like an inevitability.
Sullivan didn’t think of himself as the kind of man who was kissed; he did the kissing. He liked the action of it, the dominance of it, and he’d been told by a high school girlfriend that he was a bullying sort of kisser to boot, a complaint he’d taken as a compliment, but he felt helpless here, overwhelmed and stupid and shocked, and all he could do was keep kissing Tobias, keep kissing him as if they would never stop, not until the sun expanded and the world went up in flames. It still might not be enough.
They didn’t fuck that night. They were too tired, too locked into this one simple act. They stumbled upstairs only when they were too weary to stand anymore, and then they lay in the dark in the cool sheets, legs entwined, fingers linked, mouths still brushing lightly, lips sore, until they slept.
* * *
After that, it was like a dam had broken. If Tobias stood still for more than five seconds and they weren’t actively working, Sullivan’s mouth was on his. Tobias would complain if Sullivan weren’t so damn good at it. Sullivan kissed him like Tobias was his, his to use and enjoy and take care of, and Tobias—Tobias couldn’t remember ever feeling this full, this safe.
All day Thursday, as they once more followed Cindy Jackman through her day-to-day life, Tobias thought about those kisses. In fact, the only thing that seemed to wipe the idea of kissing from his mind entirely was when Sullivan passed his laptop over to where Tobias was slumped in the passenger seat of the Buick reading aloud from Android.
The class catalog for Metro State University of Denver had been downloaded.
“Here.” Sullivan tapped the casing until Tobias reluctantly set the book aside.
“What is this?”
“It’s a computer,” Sullivan said helpfully.
“No duh.”
“Okay, leaving aside the fact that you’re an eighth-grader, it’s a random thought activity.”
“Random thought activity,” Tobias repeated, pretending he hadn’t been busted for saying something lame enough to pass for a middle schooler.
“Indulging a random thought for the sake of it. Pick one class that you could bear taking. You won’t actually take it. You don’t even have to tell me what it is. There are only two rules. The class can’t be in the hard sciences, and it has to be something you don’t already know a lot about.”
“Subtle,” Tobias said wryly.
“You’re the one who keeps saying you’re not a spoiled rich boy. At some point you’re gonna need a job, yeah?” Sullivan smirked. “I’ve heard great things about Underwater Basket Weaving 101.”
Tobias didn’t know what to think of the activity, to be honest. He’d been locked into medicine for so long that he’d never considered what other options were out there, so it might be interesting. He couldn’t be Sullivan’s lackey forever, after all. If he felt a small twinge of unhappiness at the idea, he brushed it off. He was here for Ghost. This was temporary.
“Thanks,” he said, and Sullivan nodded, already watching out the window again, as if he really thought either Cindy Jackman or the balding man who’d used her car to pick up Ghost might show up any second, something Tobias was less certain about every day.
He worked his way through the class catalog, losing track of time so thoroughly that he didn’t look up again until Sullivan ordered him to go get them some sandwiches from the shop at the other end of the strip mall.
“Did you find anything you liked in the catalog?” Sullivan asked, once they were eating.
“Not yet, but I’m only through F. It’s kind of fun.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Thinking about what I might do with the rest of my life. There are possibilities there that weren’t there before, and it’s... I’m excited about it. For the first time that I can remember, the idea of moving forward feels good instead of terrifying.”
Sullivan was licking mustard off his fingers, eyeing Tobias like he’d done something perplexing, like taken his clothes off to dance a jig. “I don’t understand why you didn’t do this a long time ago.”
Tobias fiddled with one corner of his sandwich bread, tearing it and rolling it into a ball. “When I was four or five, one day someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew u
p, and I said I wanted to be a doctor so I could spend all day with my papa.”
Sullivan grinned. “That’s adorable. You’re an adorable boy, Tobias.”
“You’re not the only one who thought so.” Tobias tore another piece loose, then a third. “My papa was so proud. He told the rest of the family and all his colleagues and friends and it turned into a whole thing. At one point, back in high school, he was talking about the two of us practicing together.”
“Snowballed on you, huh?”
“Yeah. It was cast in stone from so early on that for years I didn’t stop to think about whether it was a good thing or not. That was the way it was, you know? Tante Esther was mean, you saved mangoes for Saturday pajama mornings, and I was going to be a doctor. For a long time it wasn’t any big thing, you know? What does a ten-year-old care about a career path? It wasn’t until high school that it started to feel real.”
“That was part of the breakdown, huh?”
“I tried rebelling like a normal teenager for a while. Parties. Staying out past curfew. Little rebellions like that.” He gave Sullivan a sheepish look. “It didn’t last long. I wasn’t very good at it, and it only made me feel worse. My parents didn’t understand. Of all my siblings, I was adopted the youngest, and I haven’t had a lot of the same problems, so I could tell they didn’t know where it was coming from. I didn’t know how to say that the idea of graduating from high school was making me wish I could hibernate until it was all over.”
“You thought hurting yourself was preferable to telling them the truth about how you felt?” Sullivan was mostly watching the nonprofit building, but he was glancing over frequently, his brow furrowed. The fact that he cared helped counter the anxiety of the subject matter.
“I didn’t want them to hate me.”
As soon as he said it, he felt stupid. Of course they wouldn’t hate him; they loved him. Even as angry as he was with them now, he knew that. But feelings didn’t always reflect reality, and they didn’t have to make sense. He had to train himself out of that kind of thinking. Train himself into thinking of his needs and opinions as equally valid, as well as being the ones that he weighted the most when it came to decisions like this.
“That wouldn’t happen,” Tobias said, when it looked like Sullivan was about to ask how likely it was. “But he’ll be hurt when I tell him I’m not going to be a doctor anymore.”
Later, while Tobias read in the living room, Sullivan got caught up on his subpoenas, cursing under his breath the whole time. He also called his sisters—all five of them in a row, and spent nearly three hours altogether in his bedroom in conversation with them about various jobs, men, children, sports, and parents-in-law. Tobias and Sullivan made dinner together afterward, talking about a million small things, none of which were related to the case.
It was oddly, satisfyingly domestic.
That night, tired and pressed for time, Sullivan slid on top of Tobias and pushed his thighs apart with his knees. Sullivan kissed him deeply, rocking their dicks together in a slow-building, shuddering rhythm until Tobias couldn’t breathe through the heat. “You love that I make you feel like this, don’t you?” Sullivan asked, his voice low and smug.
Tobias nodded helplessly.
“Yeah, I thought so. For a good boy, you’re awfully needy. I’m going to have to give you a lot of cock to keep you satisfied, won’t I, Tobias?” Sullivan was looking at him with dark, expectant eyes, and he knew exactly what Sullivan wanted to hear.
“Yes,” Tobias whispered. His face couldn’t be more painfully red. Perhaps tomorrow he would be horrified by the things they were saying, but right now it was a fire in his blood.
“Do you know why?”
An answer crept to the tip of his tongue, but Tobias couldn’t say it. Could he? Sullivan was still watching him, probably expecting something along the lines of because I’m a bad boy, but somehow the real words came out, tiny but daring, “Because I’m a slut.”
Sullivan’s breath caught and his eyes widened. “Oh, that’s good, sweetheart.” Sullivan leaned down, nosed at Tobias’s jaw, pressing a kiss there in reward. “God, you’re so good for me.”
The praise sank into Tobias deeply, made him shudder with warm, sweet pleasure. It was almost enough to override the heat that came from Sullivan’s continued words. Almost.
“Maybe I’ll make you beg for it,” Sullivan murmured thoughtfully. “Make you beg to get fucked. Make you beg to suck me. I can do anything I want and you’ll like it. Because you’re a slut, aren’t you?”
“Please.” Tobias had felt filthy and overwhelmed when he said that forbidden little word—slut—but it was so much hotter when Sullivan said it. He was so close. He lifted his hips, trying to get more friction. “Please let me come.”
“Not yet. Not until you admit you want it.”
He couldn’t think, his mind hazy and blank, but he obeyed instinctively. He gasped, “I want it.”
“That’s my good boy. Go ahead and come, sweetheart.”
“I want it,” Tobias repeated, just for himself, and came in a long rush against Sullivan’s belly.
“I know,” Sullivan replied, and he came too, his mouth hot and demanding against Tobias’s the whole time.
Are you allowed to kiss people like you might be dying during casual sex? Tobias typed out in a message to Church while Sullivan was in the bathroom getting a washcloth for cleanup.
He didn’t send it.
* * *
On Friday, after they followed Cindy home from early dinner with her girlfriends, they parked down the street and waited. Eight-thirty was too early to assume she was in for the night.
“It’s been a week.” Tobias rolled his window up, grimacing and slapping at the gnats and no-see-ums. Sullivan didn’t blame him; the tiny annoyances were legion after dark. “At what point do we go ask Cindy about the guy who took her car?”
“At the point when otherwise we have to abandon the case.”
“And we’re not there yet?”
“You said it yourself—it’s been a week. Do you see everyone in your whole life every week? Patience is a virtue.”
“I’m patient.” He fidgeted in his seat for a second. “Okay, but what about K in Ghost’s phone? We have to call at some point, right?”
“Nope. The logic there hasn’t changed. We don’t want anyone to know we’re looking.” Sullivan flicked him on the leg. “Chill. It’ll happen sooner or later.”
When a trace of mulish rebellion crossed Tobias’s face, Sullivan smiled. The guy might pretend to be mild-mannered, but still waters ran deep.
Almost challengingly, like he could sense that Sullivan was amused by him and he wanted to undermine it, Tobias asked, “Why haven’t you spanked me?”
Sullivan’s smile slipped off his face. He considered and discarded a half-dozen responses before finally saying, “Why would I?”
Tobias shrugged. “It all goes together, doesn’t it? Whips and chains and BDSM...spanking’s part of it.”
“You know that how?”
“CSI.”
“Jesus.” Sullivan might’ve laughed if he wasn’t feeling like he might suffocate any minute. “Kink doesn’t have to include pain. Not everyone likes it. So I didn’t bring it up.”
“Kink doesn’t have to include edging or anal, either, and you brought those up without knowing if I’d like them.” Tobias darted a glance at him. Whatever Sullivan’s expression was doing—he honestly wasn’t sure—made Tobias add, “It’s okay if you don’t want to, but...do you want to hurt me?”
Sullivan considered lying. It was the sort of question with a clear right answer; social expectation demanded a no. It would be easier to lie, too, because then they could be done with it. He wasn’t sure what could be gained from this conversation in the first place. Tobias might seem all right talking about the subject theoretically, but
pain wasn’t like other elements of kink. Wanting to tease someone wasn’t the same as wanting to hurt them. Sooner or later Tobias would see that, and it would get ugly between them, and however the blackmail thing had twisted them up to start, they’d somehow settled into something far less angry. He liked Tobias, far more than he’d expected to. He liked how light it was between them, both in bed and out, liked how they fit, and taking this into that area of kink would only screw everything up.
At the same time, it had been so long, and now that Tobias had brought it up, he couldn’t stop picturing it: Tobias lying naked across Sullivan’s thighs, his breathing fast, his cheeks firm and ready for Sullivan’s hand, all that perfect skin, warm and unblemished and...that was where Sullivan’s brain started to short circuit. He should say no, because anything else would ruin everything. But he really wanted to say yes.
In the end he didn’t say anything at all.
The silence stretched and stretched.
He realized he’d been clenching his hands around the steering wheel when Tobias started trying to peel his fingers off.
“Easy,” Tobias said quietly. “I’m not going to judge you. You’re not in trouble, and I’m not going to be mad. It’s not like I can’t guess just from your reaction.”
Of course he had. Tobias was a lot of things, but stupid wasn’t one of them. Sullivan pulled his hands free and shook out the aching joints. “You sound like a mom.”
Tobias sat back, startled. He glanced out the window at the little green house, mouth turning somber at the corners. “That’s the sort of thing Manman says when me or one of my siblings is upset. I guess the shoe fits.”
“You miss her.”
“Yes. And don’t change the subject.”
“I’m not changing the subject. Why don’t you call her?”