by Liz Jacobs
After a while, it had become a delaying tactic.
With Dex, it was a prelude to everything he could have ever wanted and had no idea how to ask for. But beyond the want and need and the hesitant freedom, Nick couldn’t stop thinking about all those boys Dex had been with, all the ones who’d probably known exactly what to do when Nick had no idea where to even start. So Nick kissed him as best he could, and then, between one moment and the next, closed the distance enough that his erection ground against Dex’s hip.
“Oh fuck.” Dex’s voice ran through Nick like a knife. He shuddered. It was, all of it, so much. It was too much, and he probably should have been stopping, but the crack in Dex’s voice, his breath so hot against Nick’s mouth, and the feel of him, even through layers of fabric, was close to sending Nick over the edge. He didn’t want to stop. Couldn’t.
“Can we—” He didn’t know how to ask for it. He didn’t know what to ask for. He was filled to the brim with too much sensation and not enough thought.
“Yes, God. What do you want, I’ll do—whatever.”
Nick kissed Dex. Ground so hard that they both gasped in just a little bit of pain, but he didn’t know what to say. He felt small and stupid and completely out of control. Dex ran his hands all the way down Nick’s back, setting him alight in the wake of his touch, grabbed Nick’s ass, and pulled him in.
Nick rocked against him. Dex’s hands guided him away, then pulled him back in. Nick squeezed his eyes shut and rocked once more, rolling his hips in a way that felt unbelievably dirty and unbelievably good. He let Dex guide him.
Dex’s touch was hard, nearly painful, but it felt like purchase and allowed him to lose himself in the rhythm. Dex moved his mouth down Nick’s jaw, to the spot that had nearly undone Nick the first time they’d kissed.
Nick gasped. All his bones felt liquefied. Dex sucked. Moved them both faster. Nick tried to stop himself from making noise, tried to contain it, even a little, but then Dex’s harsh breath ghosted over his ear and he murmured, “Just like that, baby, yes. God. So fucking good.” And Nick couldn’t have stopped if his life depended on it.
He rode the wave, rode Dex’s hips, let it wash him so far off shore he may as well have been lost to sea. He didn’t fucking care. He was lost to it, all of it. To Dex, to his truth, to all that had been laid bare in this small, warm room.
He wrapped his arms around Dex’s neck, his dreads dry and a little prickly against his skin, pushed himself even closer, lost the rhythm of it but kept going anyway, and then Dex took hold of his hair, pulled him back, and crushed his mouth against Nick’s. It wasn’t even a kiss. Mouths hungry, tongues seeking and finding filthy contact. Nick’s blood rushed south. He tried to stem the tide, to get enough control not to come, but Dex whispered against his mouth, “You’re close, aren’t you? God, so fucking hot.” Nick shuddered uncontrollably and came.
A murmuration of starlings, this release, like a vast emptying of thought. He trembled in place, but Dex had hold of him and Nick felt, for the first time, like he could fall apart and not hit the ground on impact.
When he came down, he could tell Dex was still hard—and that was a revelation, the sheer physicality of Dex’s want—and Nick tried to give something back. He hid his face in Dex’s neck and snaked his hand down in between them until he felt it. Then he ran his palm all the way down Dex’s erection, felt Dex shudder against him. In the silence where all he could hear was Dex’s breath, Nick worked his palm up and down the hard length.
It felt like—nothing else. If he had allowed himself to think of it before, he would have thought it would be like getting himself off, mechanical and easy. He hadn’t expected to feel that longing tug in his belly, or the way in which his own pulse stuttered under his skin. This was Dex, and Nick was making him feel good.
Spurred on by the way Dex grabbed onto him and let him do this in silence, Nick fitted his fingers against as much of Dex’s dick as he could with denim in the way and worked him faster, pressed against him harder. He licked a stripe up Dex’s neck, bit his earlobe. Tasted the salt of his skin again and again. And then Dex tensed, gasped, and shuddered as he came. Nick felt the heat of it against his hand a moment later, and a lightness stole over him, so fizzy and bright he had to hide his grin in the darkness of Dex’s neck.
They breathed against each other as Dex came down. Dex stroked Nick’s hair and held him. Nick let him.
+
Dex roused them. Kissed the side of Nick’s head, forcing a tiny wave of shivers down his skin, then pulled Nick gently away.
“You all right?”
Nick nodded. The situation in his pants wasn’t too pleasant, but he would endure it tenfold if it meant staying this close to Dex. “I’m good. I mean … really good.”
That was when Dex’s dimples appeared. Nick relaxed at the sight of them, breathed out.
“Yeah?” Dex’s voice was soft and a touch uncertain.
In a fit of courage, Nick placed both thumbs in his dimples. “I love your dimples.”
Dex huffed out a tiny laugh, and Nick watched as he shut his eyes, looking lost in—well, Nick, he supposed. In pleasure. He looked content. He had such pretty eyelashes.
Emboldened, Nick let his hands wander. Touched Dex’s cheeks, then slipped lower, felt his jaw, his neck. A rasp of stubble against his skin. He had no idea that something as simple as stubble would do a thing for him, but it did. He spread his hands and then ran them down to Dex’s collarbones, letting his thumbs stretch out the collar of his T-shirt, exposing more skin. Even though he’d seen Dex shirtless before, his heart still sped up at the idea of being able to see it again. To be allowed to look his fill. He cupped Dex’s shoulders, gave them a bit of a squeeze. Hard but yielding.
He checked that Dex’s eyes were still closed, then ran his hands towards the middle, over Dex’s chest. Across his heart. The room was still around them.
Dex’s breathing changed again. So did his own. He took in air deliberately, followed thought with movement, slipped his hands further down, over the planes of Dex’s abs. This time when he looked at his face, Dex was watching him. No trace of a smile now, and his eyes so dark. Nick didn’t let himself stop.
He ran his fingers down until he could catch the edge of Dex’s shirt and tug it up. Just the smallest bit, exposing a thin strip of skin. He dipped his hands beneath it.
Dex stayed still. Nick felt him tense beneath his touch, but not like he didn’t like it. More like he was trying to stay still for Nick.
Dex’s skin was smooth and warm. Again, a revelation. Not like he’d never touched other people’s skin before, and not like a person’s stomach was some great unknown, but his pulse sped up just from this. He never wanted to stop. He swept his thumbs toward the middle and felt a change in texture and springy curls. He leaned in. He had no direction. He knew now that he had started, he never wanted to stop touching Dex, and Dex was letting him.
So he touched his lips to the rounded edge of a collarbone. Dex was breathing fast and shallow. Nick shut his eyes. Kissed the spot again. Dex’s fingers twitched where they were planted on his hips—and how could he have forgotten that he was being touched too? But he had.
He moved until he could kiss the dip of his throat. In the stillness, he felt Dex drop his head back to give him room. Nick took it all. He licked his neck, kissed the side, sucked on a spot. The frenzy was returning. Not even five minutes after coming, he was filled with heat.
Nick moved his hips and felt the answering fullness of Dex’s cock against his own.
If they were going to do this again, they’d need fewer clothes.
Nick stilled. He wanted Dex naked more than he could remember wanting anything in his whole life, but—that was Dex.
And this was him, in all his gangly, pasty-white, awkward glory.
Dex didn’t give him a chance to question it. He was grabbing Nick’s hair and pulling him into a kiss. No preamble, it was a full fucking kiss, his tongue melting Nick from the i
nside out. Now they had started again, they weren’t stopping.
Dex plucked at the back of his T-shirt, rucked it up, and Nick broke off the kiss to raise his arms and let Dex do his worst. His T-shirt landed on the other side of the room, but he barely noticed, because Dex touched Nick’s back. His skin was coming alive under Dex’s fingers. He was trembling.
“Fuck, Nick.”
Nick could have sobbed with how good that felt. He leaned back enough to grab fruitlessly at Dex’s T-shirt, but the angle was wrong. “Can we—”
“God, yes, please. Here.”
He grabbed Nick’s bare waist with both hands—Nick nearly buckled—and lifted him up enough that he could get his legs underneath him. Then they were somehow up and scrambling to get Dex’s T-shirt off him.
Dex reached for Nick’s sweatpants and Nick reached for Dex’s jeans, and he knew they were both a mess inside their pants but he didn’t fucking care.
Dex succeeded first, and Nick stilled with his hands on Dex’s zipper, which in itself felt like the most intimate thing he’d ever been permitted to do.
He swallowed hard as Dex nudged him to step out of his sweatpants.
“Oh.”
Dex wasn’t watching his face. Oh God. Was he not enough? He couldn’t figure out Dex’s expression. “What?”
“I thought—you’re intact.”
Nick frowned.
“I mean, you’re Jewish,” Dex said, smiling. “I thought you’d be cut.”
“Oh.” Nick grinned despite himself, like he wasn’t literally on display in front of the person he wanted most in the whole fucking world. “No religion, remember? No religion, no mohel. No mohel, no bris.”
Dex pulled him in and kissed him. “Well. I know just what to do with you.”
He was so fucking hard. He wanted so much. He wanted everything.
“C’mon,” he whispered and tugged on Dex’s zipper. “Now you.”
Dex stepped back and took care of his own situation. Nick watched with wide eyes as he stepped out of his jeans and briefs all in one go.
God. Dex was fucking breathtaking. He looked like a picture. He was everything. Nick’s throat went dry, but he couldn’t stop looking. Dex’s cock was so dark, and so hard.
“Oh, God, is that a tattoo?”
Dex looked unfocused as he glanced down. “Wha— oh, right. Yeah. It’s—it’s stupid, I know.”
It wasn’t. It was beautiful. Black ink curving around his upper thigh in the space where the cut of his hip ran into sparsely haired leg. Three lions, it looked like, two lying down, one standing tall behind them.
“Is that—”
“Pride. I know.” Dex rolled his eyes. “Corny.”
“No, it’s beautiful.” Without thinking, Nick reached out and grazed a finger across it. Dex hissed. Nick splayed his fingers, marveling at his own bravery, and took the final step that separated them. He looked up and wove his free hand under Dex’s dreads, pulled him close. Felt the wetness of their tips licking at their bellies and hips. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered.
Dex grabbed him around the waist and kissed him. “God. C’mere.” Dex sat and pulled Nick down until they both toppled onto his stripped-down bed, and oh. There was so much skin touching skin. Nick was drowning in the feel of Dex, so close and warm and alive next to him.
It took a while, but they eventually managed to settle the right way on the bed, and when they did, they couldn’t stop kissing. Nick’s hands didn’t know where to land, so he touched Dex everywhere he could reach. His inexperience became a problem when Dex showed every sign that he wanted to move beyond aimless groping and Nick tore his mouth away from Dex’s to try and—he honestly didn’t know what.
Dex latched onto his throat with his lips and teeth, forcing a shuddering gasp from Nick’s mouth and gooseflesh all down his skin.
“God, you’re so—fuck,” Dex said against him, and Nick was probably in a dream, because this felt too fucking good to be real. “What do you want, baby, what can I do?” Dex talked as he moved, his lips barely touching Nick’s skin and still forcing endless shivers from him. Hot breath, hard teeth, soft tongue, and Nick was losing his mind just from the endearment alone.
“I don’t—”
He could barely think, much less talk, much less know what to even ask for. With Lena, it had been a sort of done deal every time. Some touching to start off with, but mostly it was just … sex. And then a vast emptiness for a long moment after, filling him up with postorgasmic sadness that felt absolute. Like he was broken inside.
He realized with a belated clarity that he hadn’t gotten the same flooding sadness in his chest after coming with Dex. He’d simply felt good.
Dex moved further south, interrupting Nick’s thoughts. Dex moved until it was no longer a question of what he was doing. His dreads spilled messily against Nick’s belly, and Nick swallowed, watched helplessly as Dex wrapped one hand around Nick’s waist and pulled back the foreskin with his free hand and licked the tip of Nick’s dick.
Nick’s neck arched. It wasn’t—he wasn’t—fuck.
“God, you’re so wet.” Dex’s breath ghosted over the sensitive skin, and Nick squeezed his eyes shut in a panic, tried to think of anything that wasn’t Dex’s mouth a breath away from his cock, because he was liable to come before Dex even got his lips around him. Nothing, absolutely nothing was coming to mind, so he reached down and squeezed the base of his dick in an attempt to stem the tide. His heart was going to burst.
He heard Dex mutter a curse under his breath.
“I’m sorry, I just—” Jesus. He was gonna die of embarrassment.
“Are you fucking kidding me? That is so fucking hot. Nick.”
Nick had no words for him, because the next moment, Dex wrapped his lips around him and went down. Nick bit his own wrist. He still had a grip on the base, and so he felt the movement of Dex’s jaw against his wrist, the swallow of his throat. His skin came alive where Dex’s dreads caressed it, and his spine arched off the bed from trying not to come.
Dex was amazing. Nick had gotten blow jobs before, hell, he’d even gone down on Lena, but it wasn’t—it hadn’t ever been this ownership. Because that’s what it felt like. Dex owned what he was doing, with his whole body and heart, and with that, he owned Nick. For just this moment in time, he had Nick’s pleasure in his hands and his mouth, and Nick felt it overwhelming him as he lost himself to sensation. So tight, so wet, so hot.
Then Dex pulled away and wrestled Nick’s thighs apart enough to settle in between, splaying him, putting Nick on show, and before Nick could do a thing about it, went back down. Nick cried out. He felt so fucking wanton with his thighs spread by Dex’s shoulders, completely at his mercy, trying not to thrust up but failing. And Dex wasn’t playing around. He wasn’t taking his time about it, he was laser-focused and so fucking good, Nick could no longer hold back.
He let go of his dick and patted Dex’s hair, babbled, “Gonna—gonna come,” and finally, Dex pulled up. But it was just enough that when Nick shuddered, tensed, and came, Dex had the head in his mouth and looked at Nick. If Nick could get hard again, he would have in that very moment. Dex owned him, all right. It felt as if he came forever, pulse after shuddering pulse until he was run dry.
Done, he fell back and tried to get control of his breath.
Dex finally let go with a dirty popping noise that made Nick’s bones quiver, and Nick felt him drop onto the bed next to him.
Nick drifted somewhere around the ceiling, vaguely groping for the familiar sadness of posteuphoria, but all he found was the awareness of Dex lying beside him. He managed to raise himself up on his elbows, and when he looked down, Dex had his dick in a grip, hand not moving.
“Come here,” Nick whispered.
Dex looked tense and beautiful, sprawled naked on Nick’s bed, watching Nick like he was all he wanted to watch forever. There was a trace of Nick’s come at the corner of his mouth.
Giddiness welled up in Nick’s b
elly. He reached out a hand and said, “Let me.”
Dex moved up until they were lying face to face, and Nick kissed him, tonguing that bit of come from Dex’s lips. Dex shuddered, opened his mouth. Nick tasted himself on Dex’s tongue. He went slow, swallowing Dex’s gasps. Dex was so generous with them. Nick drank him in, inhaled him, and it was—everything.
“I can’t—yet.” Nick fought through embarrassment. “But I want to—”
“Anything. Just touch me, anything, please.” His breath ghosted against Nick’s mouth. Without thinking, Nick kissed him again, bit his chin, reached for his dick.
The next moments were filled with their ragged breathing and the sounds of Nick’s hand learning the feel of Dex. Nick wasn’t getting hard anytime soon, but he was so turned on, so tuned in. Everywhere he touched Dex felt like a relearning of himself.
Where his fingers gripped Dex, he felt an awakening of every bone and tendon and skin that did it. Dex’s cock was like silk to his touch, the thickness of it different from his own, and God, so much more. Dex was still, but his shallow breathing was giving him away. His mouth hung open, shiny, hint of pink tongue behind his teeth.
Nick sidled closer, sped up his hand to a rhythm he could control. He didn’t want to blink for fear of missing anything. He was rewarded with a ragged moan, a thrust of hips. He wanted Dex to move, to lose control the way Nick had, so he grew bolder. On the upstroke, he cupped his hand around the tip, deliberately slid it down so he exposed the head, spread the moisture he found there, and Dex hissed through his teeth, eyes squeezed shut.
Hand beginning to cramp, Nick went on, just a little faster, a little harder, a little slicker.
“God, yeah, just like that.” Dex’s voice was grit and sand. Nick hid his face in the crook of Dex’s neck, which smelled so good. Smelled like the both of them.
Dex stopped being still.
He thrashed against Nick, hips pumping, belly pressed up hard against Nick’s hand. They were so close.
Dex was so close.
Nick squashed the urge to slide down the bed and reciprocate the blow job. His mouth flooded at the thought, but he’d just mess it all up, and Dex was getting closer. The thought wouldn’t leave him alone, though, so he did the next best thing he could think of and put his mouth back to work on Dex’s neck. Dex made a strangled noise and flopped backward, giving Nick the unexpected freedom to roll over him and continue working him just like that. Dex laid out on his sheets, struggling to breathe, hips pumping, and Nick with the newfound freedom of pinning him there and watching his face.