Come Together

by Madelynne Ellis

  ‘Is Iain stealing your pussy?’ Xane asked, trying to count up how many tour stops they’d made since they’d left France. Four or five at least. That had to be twenty shags Ash had missed out on, based on his usual rate of four per gig. He didn’t realise Ash could go that long without prostituting himself. Hm, it wasn’t as if there hadn’t been ample girls and opportunities available.

  ‘Back. Tools.’ Spook and Iain squelched into view, distracting Xane from enquiring why Ash was suddenly being picky over who he bedded. They threw down a couple of spades the field marshals had supplied, along with a sack of gravel. ‘We have to get this under the wheels.’

  ‘I’ll help.’

  Xane schooled his face into neutrality. They’d brought Luthor with them, and somehow, unlike the rest of them, he was managing to make soaked look sexy. Mind you, his approach of stripping down to the bare essentials might have had something to do with that. He had on a pair of cargo shorts that were, as normal, only just hanging onto his narrow hips, a pair of very practical hiking boots and sod-all else except a big smile. He flashed the latter at Xane as he strode past him and set to work shovelling gravel.

  Xane watched him work, the muscles in his sexy back flexing, rain trickling down his spine and disappearing into the crack at the top of his arse. His tongue felt thick at the thought of licking away those droplets.

  Ash elbowed him hard in the ribs.

  ‘Ow!’

  ‘You realise your girlfriend can see you.’ He held Xane’s gaze, flicked a glance at Luthor, then looked at Xane again and shook his head. He pointed to the back window of the bus. Dani was sitting in the dry, supposedly helping by relaying messages between them and Cave Troll, except they could hear Cave Troll’s foghorn voice anyway.

  ‘What?’ Xane asked, feigning innocence.

  Ash gave him a toothy grin. ‘Pull the other one, I know you too well.’ He shook his head slightly, and then took another look at Luthor. ‘He’s hot, I’ll give you that. Not that guys interest me. You’d better stop admiring his arse though, if you don’t want everyone to know he does it for you.’

  ‘Dani does it for me.’

  ‘Yeah, but she’s not the one your dick’s hard for at the minute.’

  ‘Shut the fuck up.’

  ‘What are you two whispering about?’ Iain asked, straightening up from shovelling gravel under the back wheels. Xane rolled his eyes at Iain’s need to be involved in every conversation. He was tempted to say that it was none of his goddamned business, but Ash turned to Iain smiling.

  ‘Are we ready to push again?’ He walked forward, stripping his T-shirt off as he moved, as though they’d been discussing the merits of bare skin in the rain, and nothing more potentially volatile. He mopped his face with his shirt and tossed it aside, then shucked off his trousers too, which left him sporting a pair of black, figure-hugging shorts. Just what the world needed: wet, cold and naked rock stars! Xane rolled his eyes.

  ‘Are you trying to start a riot?’ Spook asked.

  ‘Just being practical.’

  ‘He does have a point.’ Rock Giant joined him in getting almost naked, so Iain joined in too.

  Sheep! Xane stayed clothed, and not just because, as Ash had rightly pointed out, he was sporting wood. The world didn’t need to see the entirety of Black Halo prancing about naked apart from some mud and their boots, looking like aging hippies. It just didn’t. ‘Have we not generated enough negative publicity lately?’

  Ash flashed him a salacious smile. ‘You’ve never had a problem with naked publicity in the past. I haven’t forgotten that photobook you commissioned.’

  That was different – it’d been artfully shot under studio lighting, not when they all looked like drowned rats shivering in the cold. He noticed Luthor looking interestedly at him, and that settled it for sure. No way was he encouraging that man. He might look sexy as hell with the rain in his hair and rivulets tickling the bow of his lips and the hollows formed by his collarbones, but that didn’t require Xane to act on it. He could think people were hot without ever having to touch them. Spook was hot, but he’d never bedded him. Rock Giant was hot, and he didn’t want to bed him. Ash … irrelevant. He wasn’t banging anyone besides Dani.

  ‘What’s up, Xane? Frightened you won’t measure up?’ Ash taunted him. He scooped up a handful of mud and lobbed it. Luckily it was an atrocious throw and Xane easily got out of the way.

  ‘I think it’s because he’s worried his girlfriend won’t approve,’ Iain suggested. He made a few rude hand motions implying Xane was under the thumb.

  ‘What won’t I approve of?’ Dani asked, leaning out of the rear window.

  ‘Some old-fashioned mud-wrestling.’ Rock Giant hunched down into a ready stance that Ash mirrored, before Iain piled in to tackle them both.

  ‘Are they naked?’ she squeaked, and covered her eyes, though Xane clocked her peeking through her fingers. ‘Oh, my.’

  ‘You should see the view from outside,’ Luthor said, though he wasn’t looking at the three almost naked guys. His gaze was locked fast upon Xane. ‘In fact, why don’t you come outside?’

  ‘No way,’ she protested. ‘I’m not stripping off.’

  For once Xane was heartily glad of that fact. One, he didn’t want the guys looking at her. Two, he didn’t want the guys looking at her, and three, um … he didn’t want the guys looking at her. Dani was for his eyes only, and that was nothing to do with her scars and everything to do with the fact that she was his, and he didn’t want those pervy buggers ogling her. And what the hell was Luthor on, suggesting she stripped off?

  ‘I have absolutely no objection to you getting naked, though, Xane.’

  He did, especially when Luthor was looking at him like that – like he was ready to lick the goddamn raindrops right off his skin in front of everybody.

  ‘Get ’em off.’ Ash and Rock Giant immediately jumped on him. Xane lost his T-shirt to their tugging within seconds, but he refused to be parted from his leather jeans, and threw enough hard punches that they got the message quick.

  ‘Hey, are you lot going to put your backs into this, or are you too busy arsing around?’ Cave Troll revved the engine again.

  ‘Go again, please,’ Dani relayed.

  ‘All right, all right, we’re on it.’ They all took their positions again, not that their pushing was going to make the slightest bit of difference.

  ‘One, two, three … push, damn you. Push.’

  Unexpectedly, the tyres gripped the gravel, and the bus shot forward. Four of them, Paul, Iain, Ash and Xane, pitched straight over, leaving Spook and Luthor cackling at them. Xane swept Luthor’s leg from under him and down he crumpled too. Spook started jogging to catch up with the bus, to avoid a dunking.

  ‘Oi! Get your balls away from my balls,’ Rock Giant protested as Ash wriggled around trying to stand.

  Meanwhile, Luthor cautiously raised his head, having landed beside Xane. He wiped the mud from his face and flicked it at Xane, who in turn scooped up a handful and lobbed it back. In two seconds their battle had escalated to include everyone and they were all flinging dirt and rolling around.

  Xane didn’t know how it happened. One minute he was in the middle of a battle zone, then the next he was somehow on top of Luthor, and Rock Giant, Ash and Iain were all half a field away, hot-footing it after the bus.

  ‘We should catch up too,’ he said, except he didn’t move. He couldn’t seem to make his limbs work.

  ‘Yeah.’ Luthor didn’t move either. He remained on his back, his chest rising and falling unevenly, while his mismatched eyes remained focused upon Xane’s mouth. Luthor didn’t say the words, but Xane read them off his lips anyway. What he really meant by that low sigh of agreement was: let’s stay right here and fuck.

  ‘Really,’ Xane insisted, all too aware of the heat in his loins and the swell of Luthor’s cock pressed against his leg. All of a sudden, his little fantasy about the guy’s mouth being wrapped around his cock came flooding back
, along with a healthy dose of guilt.

  Luthor shifted slightly beneath him, so their loins lay aligned. Fuck him, this guy was utter torment. He had a body made for sin and eyes that could see right into the pits of Xane’s soul. His expression was soft at the moment, soft and eager and excited. ‘Let go of me,’ Xane insisted. He wasn’t going to be persuaded into anything. Fucking Luthor would amount to ten minutes of fun and then a lifetime of torment.

  Dani wouldn’t tolerate … she’d never forgive him. Some things were just too big an ask. He didn’t want this, not really. The only man he wanted in his life was Steve and he was gone.

  ‘I’m not the one on top.’

  ‘You’re the one pushing this.’

  ‘That’s rich. Xane, I’m not the one moving, that’s you. And expecting me not to react while you’re lying on top of me rubbing your dick against mine is a bit much.’

  ‘Huh?’

  That wasn’t right. It couldn’t be right. Except that the truth was exactly as Luthor was telling it. He, Xane, was the one dictating everything. The one grinding their hips together, the one thinking about what Luthor’s lips would taste like. He was the one who couldn’t seem to stop himself. ‘We can’t. We absolutely … I can’t,’ he said more for his own benefit than Luthor’s.

  ‘Then get up. Get off me.’

  He was already up. Even without his fly holding his cock trapped against his body, he was so hard that if he came he’d risk shooting himself in the face.

  ‘Get up or I’m going to give in.’

  He felt the tension flow from Luthor’s body as he stopped resisting and gave in to his desires.

  ‘Xane,’ he whispered, his mouth opening on a sigh. Then the other man’s hands were in his hair, tugging on the long wet strands in order to bring Xane closer, while at the same time Luthor raised his head so that their lips could meet.

  ‘I warned you. I gave you ample opportunity to get up and walk away. This is it, now. Last chance.’ He spoke the words right into Xane’s mouth as their lips met.

  Sweet, sweet bliss rolled through Xane’s tensed limbs. Luthor tasted of rain and memories. He smelled of sin and his touch burned. It filled him with a sort of fever. He could get lost in Luthor and forget about everything … or, rather, he could allow himself to remember.

  ‘I want you,’ Luthor whispered into his ear. ‘I want to touch you all over, blow you, make you so hard and on edge that you can barely remember who you are.’

  He wasn’t far from that point already.

  ‘And then I want you to fuck me.’ His hands moved from Xane’s hair to his shoulders, then slid down his back to tighten upon his arse. ‘I’ve never forgotten you, or how good it felt. Do you remember it too, Xane? We were good together, weren’t we?’

  They had been. He and Steve had been glorious together, but this wasn’t Steve, it was Luthor, and great sex didn’t necessarily make a good relationship.

  He and Dani had a good relationship, one he was apparently on the verge of wrecking. Stumbling across some iota of sense, Xane pushed Luthor to arm’s length and held him there while he tried to catch his breath. His cock was hard and jerked with excitement every time Luthor moved so much as a finger, but that didn’t make what they were doing right.

  Dani would be distraught. He’d destroy her with this. He’d turn her into a clone of her lunatic mother.

  ‘Stop. Enough. We can’t … I can’t.’

  Luthor hooked a leg around Xane’s and rolled them both over, so that he lay on top. ‘You’re one hell of a tease, Xane Geist.’

  ‘I’m not teasing.’ Xane wetted his lips, turning the piercing through the bottom one. ‘I can’t hurt her like this. If she wasn’t involved, then yes, God, yes … but she is … If you care at all about her, as you claim, you won’t do this either.’

  ‘I’ll share,’ Luthor mumbled as his mouth descended upon Xane again.

  Their tongues clashed. It was impossible not to respond. He was hard, so hard and aching for release. He wanted to fuck this man. Wanted to relive the memories they shared and just live in the moment for a while. The last few months of his life had been crazy and intense. His whole world had fallen apart, and, though he’d tried to piece it back together, there were still bits of himself that seemed to be missing. He was still so angry over everything that had happened. It was all so raw, too tender to touch.

  He wanted to fuck and forget, but not with Dani.

  He didn’t want their relationship to be about anyone but them. No way would he allow Spook or Rock Giant to be right. Using Dani wasn’t an option. Theirs wasn’t a rebound relationship, it was the real deal. He wanted to be with her for the rest of his life.

  And he was a fool, because, even as he was thinking that, he was incredibly close to doing the one thing that would destroy them for ever. He laughed. Who was he kidding? He was already doing it.

  ‘Xane?’ The voice wasn’t Luthor’s, or Dani’s, thank God. It belonged to Ash, who’d come back to retrieve his jeans, or rather his phone which was in the pocket of his jeans. His presence pulled Xane sharply back to reality. ‘Are you trying to prove you’re the biggest dick on the planet, or what?’

  Ash’s hand tightened upon Luthor’s shoulder. ‘Get off him.’

  ‘This isn’t anything to do with you, Ash,’ Xane said, though admittedly he was relieved Luthor was no longer straddling him and providing such an alarming temptation.

  ‘The hell it isn’t. Not ten minutes ago you told me you were a Dani exclusive.’

  He didn’t recall using those words, but figured that’s how Ash had interpreted whatever he had said.

  ‘Get lost,’ Ash told Luthor. ‘You’re needed to do set-up, so go do it. And that’s an order.’

  Luthor looked to Xane for guidance, but he barely managed to shake his head. ‘Go,’ he murmured.

  It was hard watching Luthor stalk off through the rain towards the heart of the festival. It tugged at Xane’s emotions more than he thought it ought to have done.

  Ash offered Xane his hand in order to help him stand. ‘What are you doing?’ he asked. He shook his head, seeing exactly how upright Xane was standing, and decided to put on his jeans as a defensive shield. ‘I know you’re like a nuclear device, and you can’t help pressing that big old red button, but fooling around with the roadies is seriously pathetic. Am I to take it that you and Dani aren’t getting along as well as you’re both making out?’

  ‘We’re fine. It’s not that. I don’t know.’ Xane shook his head, making the ends of his wet hair swish. ‘My head’s all over the place at the moment.’

  ‘It’s in your dick.’ Ash cast Xane another uneasy glance as he struggled to draw the wet fabric up his legs. ‘Can’t you get that thing to go down? Think about depressing shit or something.’

  That never worked. He’d spent years conditioning himself to react in this way to depressing shit.

  Xane turned his back, so Ash didn’t have to look at him until he’d finally won the fight with his jeans and was all zipped up.

  ‘Why did you come back?’ he asked.

  ‘Because Ginny would kill me on two counts if I hadn’t. One, because without my phone she can’t reach me, and two, she’s Dani’s best bud, and I’d never hear the last of it if you screwed things up. When I see her, I want us to be doing dirty sex stuff, not discussing why you’re a monumental dick.’

  ‘You’re seeing her?’ Xane realised. ‘Like exclusively dating her?’ It made sense of one or two things, like the lack of fights over Ash trying to sneak groupies onto the bus. ‘Since when? And why keep it such a secret?’

  ‘Because I want to give it a chance to work, dumbo.’ Ash nudged him in the kidneys and they both started walking. ‘We’re taking baby steps, and for the same length of time as you and Dani, to answer that question.’

  For the same length of time, but while being apart! Now Xane really did feel like a complete dick. Ash was managing to be more faithful than he was, and this was the man who routi
nely had three or four girls a night and had no concept of boundaries.

  ‘I expect you to keep that knowledge to yourself,’ Ash muttered. ‘I do not want my first real relationship in years to be tomorrow’s news headline.’

  ‘Is that who you sneaked off to meet in Paris?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And nobody knows?’

  ‘Spook knows.’

  Of course he did. Spook knew everything about all of them.

  ‘Iain?’

  ‘I don’t want Iain to know. I don’t have to share everything with him.’

  ‘How come?’ It sounded as if there might be a story behind that.

  Ash blew him off. ‘We’re not changing the subject to me. What the fuck’s up with you? Do I need to get rid of Luthor?’

  Tension shot spikes of pain through Xane’s brows. ‘No,’ he muttered. ‘Don’t. It was a moment of madness is all, and as much my fault as his. If you’re going to start sacking people, you’d better sack us both.’

  ‘Except without you we’re nothing. We need to make this work, Xane. Somehow … I know it’s tough at the moment. We all knew it would be when we set out.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Living on the road was always uncomfortable, but that was part of the job. He wasn’t honestly sure if this time was worse than any other. Sure, Steve’s absence was a constant pain, as was Iain’s presence, and he wasn’t exactly getting on with Elspeth, but having Dani with him was definitely a boon.

  Ash patted him on the back again. Without saying much else, they trudged to where the tour bus and the rest of the Black Halo vehicles were parked up. There didn’t seem to be much more to discuss, at least not with a gig on the horizon. Getting deep was going to involve a heck of a lot of alcohol.

  Chapter 29

  Sally Kettering, their battleaxe PR manager, stood waiting for them by the tour bus, huddled under an enormous umbrella. She stared down her nose at them both in disgust when they plodded into view. They were muddy and wet through. Xane had bits of grass stuck in his hair, and frankly he didn’t give a damn.