by Kim Fielding
Parker took a step closer. “I want to touch now.”
They didn’t grab at each other, although the greedy part of Wes’s psyche wanted to. Instead they stood inches apart, watching as they traced each other’s bodies with their fingers. No skin had ever felt so soft and smooth, so hot. No joints had ever been assembled so cleverly, no muscles felt so firm, no nipples had ever tasted so sweet.
Oh. Tasting. Wes became aware he was licking Parker—nuzzling at the crook of his neck, rasping along his collarbone, sucking delicately on pebbled nubbins of flesh. Parker, meanwhile, had removed Wes’s hair tie and was combing fingers through his still-damp hair. Parker shivered.
“You’re cold.”
“No.”
Wes was willing to believe him; he felt a bit quivery himself. When Parker moved his hands to Wes’s ass and began a caress, Wes’s knees went wobbly. “Bed.”
They did not proceed elegantly to the mattress. Parker almost tripped over one of his boots, Wes banged a leg on an ugly little table, and they got slightly tangled in each other’s limbs. But they made it to the bed, Parker falling onto his back and dragging Wes down on top of him.
Perfect.
They both seemed to remember there was no hurry. An uncertain future stretched ahead, but at least they had all night. Wes wanted this to be far different from the rapid grope-and-fuck he was accustomed to. This was special.
Parker ran his hands down Wes’s back, returned to his shoulders for a quick little massage, and then down again to settle on Wes’s ass. “God, you feel amazing,” he said. “Solid. And you’re really here.”
“I’m here.” All of him. Because right now the past didn’t matter and the rest of the world was a universe away. He had Parker’s lips against his and then more of Parker to explore with his mouth. Sternum. Ribs. The divot of his navel. The tender skin inside his thighs. The muskiness of his balls. Wes took a single broad swipe the length of Parker’s shaft, but when Parker responded with a hip jerk and garbled curse, Wes decided to be cruel. He repositioned himself and moved back up Parker’s body. Slowly. Nibbling here, tongue-tickling there, until they were face-to-face, and then he dug his teeth gently into Parker’s lower lip and gave a light tug.
Parker did not passively succumb to this process. He had his hands all over Wes, kneading and smoothing. He brought them back often to Wes’s head, where he pulled at Wes’s hair. Not hard enough to hurt, not even close, but firmly enough to imply some possessiveness. His touches said You’re mine, at least for now—and Wes was thrilled to hear it.
They kissed some more, bodies softly undulating against each other. Heat built inside of Wes, and he was glad they hadn’t managed to pull the blankets over them. They rubbed their cocks together. Hard. Wet. So, so good. Parker tilted his head back on the pillow, granting Wes better access to his long, vulnerable neck. He splayed his legs, and when Wes’s cock slipped lower to press against the tender spot behind Parker’s balls, Parker shuddered beneath him. “Rubbers and lube. Please tell me you have rubbers and lube.”
Wes froze. He hadn’t planned for this. He usually kept supplies in his toiletries bag in case he was in the mood for a hookup during a visit to Portland. But he hadn’t been thinking of that this time, when he expected to simply drop off Rhoda’s shelf and return home. He couldn’t remember when he had last restocked the bag.
“Hang on.”
Separating himself from Parker was almost physically painful. He hurried to the bathroom—dick bobbing annoyingly—where he rooted desperately in the small zippered bag. And…. “Got ’em!” He ran back to Parker, waving his prizes triumphantly. Parker clapped as if Wes had just won an Olympic gold medal.
Fortunately the interruption didn’t break the mood. In fact, seeing Parker spread out on the bed, eagerly awaiting him, made Wes giddy with want. Parker grabbed his arm as soon as he was within reach. “How fast can you get that rubber on yourself?” he asked with a smile.
The stupid foil packaging was almost impossible to open. Wes dropped it twice before managing to rip the damn thing and get the condom out. Then he had to roll it on, which usually wasn’t difficult, although it certainly was tonight. That was because Parker was staring at him, big-eyed, jacking himself slowly and firmly.
Wes muttered a quick entreaty for the gods to help him last more than five seconds.
The next step, of course, was to get Parker nice and slippery. Wes would have enjoyed that task, yet he wasn’t the least disappointed when Parker poured some lube on his own fingers and, lips curled in the world’s most wicked grin, worked two fingers inside himself.
“Jesus.”
“Told you. I’m Jewish.”
How could Parker manage to be heart-droppingly sexy and so impish at the same time? It was a superpower, perhaps. All that mortal Wes could manage was to avoid exploding at the brush of Parker’s fingertips.
They slid a pillow under Parker’s hips. “Come here,” he said and then wrapped his legs around Wes’s waist, pressing his heels against Wes’s butt as Wes gradually pushed into his body. “Perfect. God, so perfect.”
The tightness, the friction, the intimate noises of bodies moving together—Wes was accustomed to those. Alone, they wouldn’t have overcome him. But Parker pulled him down for another scorching kiss. That kept Wes from thrusting as freely, yet it connected them completely, closing a circuit and sending electrical impulses thrumming through them in a dizzying loop. And that was enough to overwhelm Wes entirely. He became aware of every fluttering cell in his body and in Parker’s, of every sparkle of life, and he came with such intensity that his vision went gray.
Parker fell right after, arching against Wes’s belly and crying out into their kiss.
A measureless time afterward, they lay squashed together with the blankets over them. One of the lights was still on, but neither had gathered the energy yet to do anything about it. The used condom, its empty wrapper, and the bottle of lube lay on the nightstand like a still-life painting. It would be titled Afterglow, Wes decided.
“So that was worth waiting for.” Parker’s head lay against Wes’s shoulder, and he was playing with the fingers of Wes’s left hand.
“Agreed.”
“I love the way your calluses feel when you touch me. It’s… really butch.” He laughed.
“Good.” Wes realized he was being even more taciturn than usual, but his ability to speak hadn’t completely returned. Probably a lot of his blood was still way south of his brain. He was content to be tickled by Parker’s hair and warmed in the cocoon of blankets.
Suddenly Parker went still. “Do you want to see something totally stupid?”
“Um, okay.”
Parker sat up a little and pointed to a spot on his chest, just over his heart. “Look.”
Wes didn’t see anything. “At what?”
“Look closer.”
Obediently Wes narrowed his eyes and leaned in. “A freckle?”
“That’s not a freckle. It’s the world’s tiniest tattoo.”
On closer inspection, it did look more black than brown. “Why do you have the world’s tiniest tattoo?”
“It wasn’t supposed to be. It was supposed to be a really awesome sailing ship. You know, the old-fashioned kind with tall masts and a winged unicorn figurehead. And it was going to be in the middle of a wavy ocean and have a cloud with a face blowing on it from the sky. Rhoda’s friend Ery is an amazing artist—one of his paintings is in my bedroom—and he drew it for me. It was going to symbolize my journey to find myself and be like a talisman to help me find my life path.”
“It sounds like you gave it a lot of thought.”
“I did! Like, for months. I asked around a lot and found a really good tattoo artist who was willing to adapt Ery’s drawing for me. I saved up money for this. I’m not usually very good at saving.”
Wes nodded and chose to hold his tongue about that issue. “What happened?”
“The big day arrived. I showed up at the studio with th
is guy I’d sort of dated but we broke up but we were still friends, and his new girlfriend who was really cool, so they could provide moral support. I signed all the forms. And… then the tattoo artist stuck the needle in me.”
“It hurt?”
Parker sighed. “Yeah. And I’ve never been great about needles anyway. I always hated getting shots when I was a kid. But it was more than that.” Another sigh, with Parker’s expelled breath puffing pleasantly over Wes’s bare skin.
“What else?”
“My mom. I was suddenly worried about what she’d say.”
That surprised Wes. Rhoda hadn’t struck him as judgmental or narrow-minded. Most of her employees sported visible ink, as did a good portion of her clientele. “She disapproves of tattoos?”
“Not exactly. It’s just…. We’re Jewish, right? Traditionally Jews don’t get tattooed. I think there’s something about it in Leviticus. But Mom and I are not very observant at all. I mean, we eat ham and that’s in Leviticus too, and for that matter, I think there’s some antigay stuff in there and Mom certainly never cared about that. But still. I was lying there on the table thinking, what will Mom say? ’Cause maybe she’d think that spending all the money on something like that was dumb and that a great big spread of ink was something I’d regret when I’m older. So I chickened out. And that’s how I ended up with the world’s tiniest tattoo.”
“I like it,” Wes said. He kissed his fingertip and touched it lightly against the tiny dot.
“You don’t think I’m an idiot?”
“Parker, you are many things. An idiot is definitely not one of them.”
Smiling with what might have been relief, Parker grabbed Wes’s fingertip and pressed his lips briefly to it. Then he let go and slithered completely under the blankets.
Wes took a deep shuddering breath and decided he was capable of a second round.
Chapter Thirteen
WES WAS so damned hard to read. But he didn’t regret the previous night, Parker was certain of that. Wes had awakened with a smile on his face and an eagerness to participate in Round Three. Morning sex was the best kind. Maybe not as earth-shaking as the First Time—and holy fuck, that had been amazing!—but slower and sweeter. The First Time was like some kind of Asian fusion dish, all succulent meats, delicious veggies, and firecracker spices. The Second Time, right before they fell asleep, was a filling side dish of carbs and complex sauces. But the morning sex was dessert. Rich bread pudding with fruit and caramel sauce, the kind of treat you savored slowly, exclaiming all the time that you were totally full and couldn’t possibly eat any more while continuing to spoon it into your mouth.
Parker was hard just thinking back on Round Three. He squirmed a bit in Morrison’s passenger seat.
So yeah, Wes had definitely been on board with all three courses. But he wouldn’t commit to Thanksgiving dinner, which was weird because a shared feast seemed a smaller commitment than sex. And now as they navigated through traffic south of Seattle, Wes was monosyllabic at best.
On the other hand, Parker babbled. He knew he was running at the mouth—going on about music and movies and the time he worked for three months at a mail store. “You wouldn’t believe the things people try to ship and the creative ways they wrap things,” he said. Wes laughed in the right places, so he was probably listening.
But even Parker wasn’t paying full attention to his own ramblings, because his mind was in turmoil. He had so many whirling emotions that he couldn’t begin to deal with them all. Delight at hooking up with Wes. Joy over a perfect date night with dinner and a late-night cruise. Uncertainty about his own future and his future with Wes. Anxiety over informing Rhoda that he and Wes were maybe sort of a thing. Curiosity about what had happened with Rhoda and that Bob Martinez guy. Sadness at Logan’s fate. Distress over the knowledge that the real story of what happened to Logan would likely never be resolved.
Those final couple of thoughts finally stopped his chatter. “Thanks for going with me,” he said. “Not the fun parts, although thanks for those too. I mean the part with Detective Saito.”
“That wasn’t fun.”
“Not even a little.” Parker drummed his fingers on his leg, then on the armrest. He recognized the current song as something Rhoda listened to occasionally, but he didn’t know the band’s name. Why did Wes have such an old-fashioned taste in music? Parker didn’t mind—in fact he liked Wes’s music—but most people Wes’s age weren’t that into groups from the sixties and seventies.
“Seattle PD isn’t going to do anything about Logan, are they?”
Wes hesitated before answering. “They might poke around a little more. But no.”
“I get it. I do. He’s dead already, and all the investigating in the world won’t change that. I’m sure they have lots of other things to worry about—people to save and bad guys to send to jail. But Logan…. They look at the case and see a twentysomething queer guy who just got fired from his job babysitting dogs, who owed back rent even though he was spending a lot of money on a bigass tattoo, who liked to smoke weed and play video games. He wasn’t going anywhere in life and wasn’t especially important to anyone.” He sniffed and added the rest in a whisper. “Not even to his boyfriend.”
Wes reached over to pat his knee. “You cared about him. Maybe you didn’t love him, but you cared.”
“Yeah. It would be nice if the cops did too.”
WES DROPPED Parker off at P-Town, where he was going to put in a few hours of work. He felt a little guilty for abandoning the place on short notice again, and Rhoda probably needed the afternoon off to get ready for Thanksgiving. “You can come in, you know,” he said to Wes as he slid out of Morrison. “Hang out. If Nevin’s there, I’ll make sure he plays nice.”
“Thanks. I have stuff to do.”
“Okay. Will you be back tonight? You can spend the night again. On the couch or in my bed.” Because Rhoda would just have to deal. Parker wasn’t a kid. And now that he thought of it, the idea of making love in his mother’s house, having to stay really quiet in the process… that was kind of hot, in a kinky fantasy kind of way.
“Probably not.”
Wes didn’t offer an excuse. Not that he owed Parker one; a one-night fling didn’t chain them at the hip. But God, it sure would be nice if Wes would be clear about what was going on in his head, because Parker didn’t have a clue.
“Okay,” Parker said.
“Last night…. Thank you. It’s the best time I’ve had in… well, ever.”
“Me too.” And that was the truth. Even without the sex, the company had been wonderful. Wes had truly listened to Parker, no matter how much Parker blathered on. As if Parker was really interesting. And when Wes made a little joke, which he didn’t do often, it was like receiving a special gift.
Somebody beeped at Wes, who was double-parked.
“I hope you join us tomorrow at least,” said Parker. “Food’s usually ready around threeish, but people start showing up a couple hours before that, and we keep eating until it’s late and we’re ready to burst.”
“Okay.”
“And no need to bring anything. In case you wondered, I mean. Some people bring dishes to share, but we always have way more food than we can possibly eat. Mom makes it her mission to ensure everyone gains five pounds no matter what.”
Wes’s little smile was enough to break Parker’s heart. “Sounds nice. But I can’t—”
“Maybe you can. Don’t say no. Or even if you do say no, you can come anyway.” He was three seconds away from begging, and the only thing that saved his dignity was a longer honk from the car Wes was blocking.
“Take care, Parker.”
“You too.” Parker shut the door and watched Wes drive away. He had no idea if he’d ever see him again.
IT WAS almost midnight by the time Parker got home. A barista named Clover had stayed to help him close P-Town for the night, and she’d been nice enough to give him a ride to Rhoda’s house. Wes hadn’t shown up.
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br /> Although Parker tried to creep inside so as not to disturb Rhoda, it turned out he didn’t have to. She sat at the kitchen table with a mug of what was probably herbal tea. She wore neon green leggings, a Pink Floyd T-shirt that once belonged to Parker’s dad, and her frumpiest gray cardigan. “Thanks for closing tonight, Gonzo.”
“No problem. But shouldn’t you be asleep?”
She waved toward the oven. “One last pie. Salted caramel apple. It’ll be out soon.” The entire house smelled amazing, like sugar and cinnamon and cookies. Rhoda generally wasn’t fond of cooking, but she got into it for Thanksgiving.
“What time should I get up to help tomorrow?”
“Before noon?” She winked. “Things are mostly under control. You can make some cranberry sauce, if you like.”
“Sure.” That had been his dad’s duty, once upon a time, and they still used his recipe.
Parker filled a glass with water from the refrigerator dispenser and sat opposite her. She looked tired, which made sense since she’d probably gotten up at five. But it was a relaxed kind of exhaustion, the kind that meant satisfaction in a job well done.
“How was Seattle?” Rhoda asked.
Parker’s cheeks flushed with a quick memory of exploring Wes’s naked body. But of course she wasn’t referring to that. “Sucky. The detective was polite, but nothing’s going to come of it.”
“I’m sorry, honey.” She reached across to take his hand. “You tried.”
“I guess.”
“And what about Wes? You enjoyed your time together?”
Dammit. Now he blushed even worse. “Yeah. He’s pretty great, actually. I invited him for tomorrow, by the way, but I don’t think he’ll come.”
“Why not?”
He groaned and laid his head on his arms. “Because I suck at relationships.” The table muffled his words, but he was pretty sure she understood anyway.
“No, you don’t. You’re everything I could hope for in a son. You’re a good friend too.”
“I suck at romantic relationships.” And that was the heart of it. Guys had fun with him for a night or maybe even a week or so, but that was it. Then they decided he wasn’t boyfriend material and moved on. Wes was a special case, of course—he might never decide anyone was boyfriend material—but that was even sadder, because Parker really liked him and hated for him to be lonely.