by Clancy Nacht
With his free hand, Zane reached out to roll Upton onto his back, watching raptly, and then parted Upton’s legs, spreading his thighs with strong fingers. He looked so intense, his brow furrowed and his teeth raking his bottom lip. When he spoke, his voice came out husky and deep, thick with lust. “You stay just like that. I’m gonna come on you.” He licked his lips and then flicked up his gaze from Upton’s sticky, spent cock to his face. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” Upton bit his lip, feeling rather, well, sexy for once. Sure, there were wistful photos taken of him for glossy magazines, but whatever glowing words they wrote were meaningless when he barely recognized himself after Photoshop was done with him.
Like this, feeling incomplete without that beautiful cock deep in him, Upton felt both vulnerable and desired. He kept his legs where Zane had left them but flexed them as he squeezed around that emptiness Zane had left. “Warn me if I need to close my eyes.”
“No, I’m gonna come right...” Zane traced his fingertip from the inside of one thigh up over Upton’s balls and across to the other thigh and smiled at him. “There.”
He stroked himself rapidly, his fist flying over his cock with a wet, rhythmic sound in time to the music playing. Zane rocked his hips, fucking into his hand as much as pulling himself, the fat head of his cock peeking from his fingers as he worked. That handsome face screwed up in an expression of determined concentration, his gaze focused in on Upton’s cock, his spread thighs, Upton’s abused hole that still grasped at nothing.
Zane stroked Upton’s thighs and toyed with his soft cock, fondled his balls, reached down to tease his opening, touching him with a lover’s tenderness. Whatever was going on between them, however transactional it might be, Upton felt valued as a man, as a partner. This wasn’t cheap like he’d expected, wasn’t what he imagined paying for sex would feel like.
Zane’s sudden gasp drew Upton’s undivided attention. The ripped muscles of Zane’s stomach stood out in sharp ridges as he hunched inward, his mouth open and his eyes almost closed. His hand was a blur over his cock, handling it roughly, and he slid his free hand over his broad chest, pinching his nipples, leaving them reddened and erect. He was so beautiful, shiny hair hanging in his face, entire body taut, on edge, over Upton. Because he wanted Upton.
Jets of white shot from between his glossy fingers, landing hot and wet across Upton’s thighs, striping his cock and balls. Zane grunted, inarticulate, and shook with his climax, bucking into his grip and painting Upton with his release.
Upton watched in fascination. That was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen. He stared down at his coated cock and balls and then back up at Zane, who was milking the last of his release. Upton stroked Zane’s abdomen, touched his chest, and then pushed a sweaty lock of hair from his face. “You really are amazing. Left me speechless, which, you can ask my colleagues, isn’t so easy.”
He bit his lip. The chances Zane might someday speak to Upton’s colleagues was kind of high. At least, after school. Upton pulled Zane in for a soft kiss, probably not quite as sumptuous as Zane tended to give, but he did what he could. He scratched Zane’s scalp the way that he said he liked and pulled him down gently so Upton could caress Zane’s body while he enjoyed his afterglow. “That was beautiful.”
“Mm.” Zane curled in against Upton and slung an arm over his chest, hugging him sweetly as he pressed his face into the crook of Upton’s neck. His soft lips brushed over Upton’s skin, and then he kissed him, chasing it with a little bite. “Some things don’t require speech, so it’s all good.” As Zane spoke, he reached down to run his fingers through the mess coating Upton’s skin, smearing it over him. “But if you’re gonna tell me something, tell me we’re gonna do this again.”
“Yes. Definitely want to do this again. I can think of new things to try. And, you know, if you have ideas, I’m in your hands.” Upton sighed happily and wrapped a leg over him, giving Zane access to anything he wanted to touch. It felt good to be touched, to have time, to know that part of him interested Zane.
“Can’t believe you’re at Georgetown. What are the odds. I’d tell you to say hello to some people, but I guess that would be awkward.” Upton kissed the top of Zane’s head. “Some great memories there. It’s a tough program, but so good. Learned so much.”
“Yeah, I’m enjoying it.” Zane lifted his head and looked down into Upton’s eyes, searching his face. “We can talk more about it next time, if you want. I should get going, though. It’s just about midnight. And you’re gonna need some sleep after that long day of yours.” Zane hesitated and then added, “You can text the number I gave you when you’re ready to reschedule or leave me a message on Skype. I’ll look forward to hearing from you, ‘Elton’. Don’t disappoint me.”
He tried not to wince at being called Elton.
“Oh, right.” Time flies when you’re having fun. Upton rolled over and checked the time, shocked that it had gone by that quickly. He’d hoped to chat about work, but then again, he wasn’t sure how much he would remember.
Upton slipped from Zane’s arms and got his wallet from the nightstand. “So, um…” He pinched all the cash and held it, not sure if he really was supposed to leave the cash on a table or if he should just hand it to Zane or what.
Zane chuckled at Upton’s awkwardness, the sound reassuringly fond, more like he thought Upton was cute than irredeemably dorky. He reached out and took it before slipping from the bed and pulling on his jeans. He tucked the bills into his pocket. “You can always leave it out on the nightstand or dresser for me to scoop up when we’re done. Avert your gaze. Pretend there’s no money changing hands.” He smiled, eyes crinkling. “For what it’s worth, I like this better. It’s more honest.”
It took him only moments to dress, and he somehow made it look graceful instead of staggering around, stumbling into things pulling on his clothes like people usually did after a hookup. When he’d pulled on his leather jacket, he returned to Upton and caught Upton’s chin in his grasp, gazing into his eyes. “One more kiss to tide me over, handsome?”
“Of course.” Upton kissed him and gave a wry smile. If handing the money over was what Zane preferred, Upton could handle that. He didn’t want to make it something it wasn’t. Since he had the room for the night, he figured after a good rinse, he could probably get a couple hours of sleep before heading home. Next time he’d know to pack a bag. “Till next time.”
“Next time.” Zane trailed a fingertip down Upton’s chest and grinned as he pulled away. “Don’t leave me hanging.”
Chapter 3
“Hey, Sloan!” Sierra’s voice carried across the quad, stopping him in his tracks. He turned to see her waving and running toward him, long black curls bouncing around her pretty brown face. “Jesus, boy, wait up!”
Sloan stood patiently waiting for her to catch up and then slung an arm around her shoulders for a sideways hug. “Hey, sugar. Don’t see you much these days.”
“Ugh, I know. I’m always so busy, and you are the invisible man.” Sierra tiptoed and then hopped to kiss his cheek before resuming their walk toward his next class. “So, listen, I’m having a party Friday night, and you haven’t RSVPed.”
He bit his lip and stopped walking to pull out his phone. “What time?”
“Eight.” Sierra craned her neck trying to see his screen. He held up his hand to block her. “What is on that fucking thing that’s so goddamn secret? You act like your private life is some James Bond spy shit. I need special clearance to see your calendar?”
“Yes.” Sloan flashed his best smile. “Sorry.”
“Mhm.” Sierra sounded dubious, but he couldn’t do much about it. His clients’ privacy was at risk when his own was threatened, and Sloan needed the money far too much to endanger his discretion.
After a moment studying the calendar and calculating travel times, he sighed and shook his head. “Sorry. No can do. I have to be across town by ten, and you’re too far north for me to make it by transit.”
; “So, call a Lyft! You can afford to live in Dupont Circle. You can afford a Lyft. Once. To make it to my bangin’ party.” Sierra gave him puppy eyes.
“Fine.”
Sierra squealed and flung her arms around him. “I have two Congressional aides coming, and three reporters for three different outlets. These people are plugged in, boo. You gotta hobnob. It’s not good you holing up by yourself all the time. No one ever sees you, Sloan. Like, ever. You’re not even on Facebook. Sometimes I wonder if you even exist, and then I see you across a crowded quad and remember you are an actual human person who walks among the living.”
Sloan wished he could tell her what kept him so busy. Hell, he was dying to tell someone—anyone—that he’d fucked the Upton Bennett almost two weeks ago. That he was fucking him again Friday night. But Zane Sawyer was no one Sierra needed to know. No one she’d want to know.
None of his friends knew, and that required he keep them at arm’s length. It got lonely, but it was what it was. Zane paid for Sloan’s expensive education, and Sloan paid for Zane’s career by forfeiting a social life.
“Okay, I’ve gotta dash.” Sierra hugged him again and then waved as she backed away. “See you Friday!”
“Yeah, see you, sugar.” Sloan watched her go with mingled longing and relief.
∞ ∞ ∞
It took Sloan more than six hours to finish his essay on comparative international public policy in Europe, half of which he spent in the library and the rest of which he spent combing databases online. As he desperately tried to refine his thesis statement, his thoughts drifted to Upton. How bad would it be, exactly, to bring his essay to his client for the evening and ask for an opinion on his work?
Probably terrible.
“Jesus, man, pull it together” terrible.
By seven, he wanted to pull his hair out. With client meetings every single day, he’d barely had time to work on assignments this week. He’d had to refill his Viagra prescription—easy enough when his prescribing doctor was paid in trade—and when he was done fucking, working out, and going to class, all he wanted to do was sleep, not work on papers. One of his clients, “Bruno,” had booked a full five hours on Tuesday for a heavy bondage session that left Sloan so exhausted he’d come straight home, skipped dinner, and slept almost until time to leave for another client Wednesday morning.
On the bright side, he’d made more than enough to pay for tonight’s Lyft. And next month’s rent.
Beside which, he was, in his own way, looking forward to tonight for more than Sierra’s party. Despite “Elton’s” reassurances, Sloan had half-expected never to hear from him again, to have scratched his itch for exploration well enough that the politician wouldn’t risk a second session. And while Elton wasn’t exactly Sloan’s type, in the bedroom he was fascinatingly unlike his public persona.
He had to remind himself that Sloan McInnis wasn’t fucking Upton Bennett. Zane Sawyer was fucking Elton. It was completely different. He had to keep those things separate if he was going to avoid trouble. Then again, most clients didn’t want to know about Sloan’s life; whatever small talk Zane offered was enough for them.
Unlike most of the men Zane serviced, Upton Bennett could have anyone he wanted. Could walk into any gay bar and have his pick of men eager to debauch a national queer icon. Hell, wasn’t that half the thrill for Sloan?
Bennett wasn’t paying for sex. He was paying for discretion.
Then Sloan remembered Bennett crying out helplessly into the pillow, sobbing his breathless release, coming just from fucking the bed with his ass full of Sloan’s cock. It wasn’t exactly the kind of sex Bennett could have with a random hookup.
So maybe it was a little about the sex.
Tonight, Zane would arrive at his appointment with Elton dressed as Sloan. There wasn’t time to change between events, and Sloan didn’t think this client would mind. He hadn’t seemed to respond in particular to the leather and denim, and perhaps a slim tailored suit would be more to his tastes. In deference to Elton’s obvious love of Zane’s hair, he rubbed some gloss drops into the tousled locks to keep them silky and shiny all night and otherwise left them alone.
Going out to see friends before work made him nervous. There was too much potential for bleed-through, a mingling of his work and personal selves. Bennett—no, Elton—was already confusing enough: someone Sloan admired without desire, someone Zane enjoyed without reserve.
Sloan arrived at Sierra’s party ten after eight, a bottle of Courvoisier in hand. She jumped into his arms in reply when he held it out as a hostess gift. He caught her and laughed, surprised at how easy affection always felt with her. He tried never to analyze these things, but she was probably his best friend, even if he saw her maybe twice a month outside of class.
“Sloan, boy, you look good!” She claimed the bottle from his hand and gave him a head-to-toe stare, her cheeks dimpling with mischief. “You said you’ve got somewhere to be at ten. Hot date?”
“You have no idea.” Sloan smiled, but his stomach plummeted. What would it be like if he could just be honest? Say he was meeting an exciting client? That he’d make enough to afford plane fare for the international studies portion of his degree?
He wanted to celebrate. To pick apart everything said and done over that bottle of cognac and cuddle through a half-watched Netflix binge. He couldn’t really date, not with his work, and he couldn’t really be Sierra’s gay best friend either, not with his discretion as bought and paid for as his body. His old friends, from when he worked the street and clubs instead of the internet, had long since ditched him over his career’s brighter trajectory, especially the growing difference between what he made and what they did. It didn’t seem to matter that he still loved them and wanted to stay close.
No, he’d become competition. Become other. Become dangerous to their fragile senses of self-worth.
“C’mon.” Sierra took his hand, breaking into his brooding, and led him deeper into her modest apartment to the kitchen, where she tucked the Courvoisier away in a cabinet for herself. Her guests would be drinking the cheap stuff.
As she poured him a martini, Sloan laughed, thanked her, and smoothed his hand over her shoulder, absorbing some much-needed human contact from the brief touch. Touching his clients never answered that craving. They were something else entirely.
He took the martini and followed her back into the living area. Music pumped through the small space. The crowd of eight other guests performed a complex mixture of conversation over drinks and languorous dance. He picked out the aides right away, and the reporters too. The other three he recognized from classes at GU, all beautiful young women in cocktail dresses.
“I’m expecting a few more,” Sierra explained as she introduced Sloan around.
It went well enough. The other policy students networked with the aides and reporters, but Sloan couldn’t muster the energy to do the same. Though Sierra encouraged him and poured him another martini, Sloan struggled with a sense he didn’t belong here. If they knew what he did, it would change who he was in their eyes, as if his identity would no longer be that of a bright twenty-something future lobbyist but that of a diseased, damaged, soulless whore.
One of the aides brought up a gay adoption case recently before the Supreme Court and how the representative he gophered for had made a speech earlier that day about the shameful state of family values, and Sloan bit his cheek not to jump in. This wasn’t his home, and he’d had two martinis, and he had somewhere else to be in an hour.
Still, he couldn’t resist a snide, “So you don’t work for Upton Bennett then.”
The man gave Sloan a withering look. “Thank God. No one is more liberal woo-woo than Bennett. His family’s produced some fine statesmen, but that apple fell a long way from the tree. Well, and his father….”
“Chad,” Sierra chided, giving the aide a look of her own. “Anyway, I think Upton Bennett’s absolutely adorable. He looks a little like Paul Newman, don’t you think?”
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“Yeah, but prettier,” Cara, one of their classmates, added. She playfully fanned herself with one perfectly manicured hand. “I count it a personal tragedy he’s gay. I’d ride that pony all around town.”
Sloan laughed. He couldn’t help himself. He covered his mouth with his hand and shook his head, helpless to rein it in.
The other aide gave Sloan a puzzled glare. “Well, you can reduce the man to his looks if you want—his whole family’s got ‘em—but he’s done more to fight for the rights of marginalized people in the Capitol in his three years in office than any of you in this room.”
Sloan sobered and nodded, trying to save face. “You’re right—”
“Tony.” The aide raised a brow at him, expectant.
“Tony. You’re absolutely right, Tony. Bennett’s a stand-up guy.” Sloan rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly too hot in his slim-cut suit. He loosened his silk tie and rolled his shoulders, prompting Sierra to step behind him and rub them for him.
Peering over his shoulder, she said, “And our reporter friends must love him. He’s always clickbait.”
“Yeah, well, his father was assassinated for breaking away from the values the Bennett dynasty stood for, and if Upton’s not careful, he’ll be following in dear old dad’s footsteps more closely than he might like.” Chad smiled nastily, and Sloan fought the urge to punch him.
God, he needed to not be part of this. He was way too involved. It shouldn’t be getting to him. He’d sat through a dozen conversations like this about a dozen other clients. It never bothered him before.
Then again, Upton Bennett was the only one on Zane’s roster who gave two shits about the queer community, women, the poor, or people of color. Upton Bennett stood up to bullies. It made it harder to listen to a bully badmouth him.