Belonging

by Alexa Land

  I texted Dante and Jessie, then went inside to see what Zan was up to and found him unpacking a big ice chest that we’d brought with us. It was stuffed full of the groceries Yosh had bought for him, as well as several homemade frozen meals that Nana had insisted we take along. “It all travelled well,” he said as he put a zip-top bag of ravioli in the freezer. “I’m surprised, given the fact that the security guard that carried this for us stopped just short of using it as a battering ram to get through the crowd of reporters.”

  “You didn’t have to do that,” I said as I hurried over and took the last couple bags from the ice chest. “You should have waited for me to come back inside and I would have put everything away.”

  “It’s not your job to handle it, love, I’m perfectly capable,” he said, taking the bags from my hands and fitting them into the freezer.

  “You must be so tired though, after yet another long day.”

  He closed the freezer and took me in his arms. “It was just as tiring for you.”

  “I’m fine,” I told him. “I’m really not tired at all.”

  Zan smiled and said, “That’s very good news,” before kissing me and running his hands down my back. The kiss heated up instantly and we began stripping off each other’s clothes, my cock swelling as he slid his hand into my briefs and took hold of it. I rubbed his hard-on through the denim as he grabbed my ass with his other hand and pulled me against him, his tongue sliding between my lips. I moaned as I unbuttoned his jeans. When I’d freed his cock, I dropped to my knees and sucked him until he was hard and leaking precum.

  Both of us were shaking by the time I stood up and pulled my sweatshirt over my head, then pushed down my jeans and briefs and stepped out of them. Zan spun me around and bent me over the kitchen table, and I grabbed the backpack I’d left on the tabletop and fumbled for the lube, dropping it twice before I managed to squirt some onto my fingers and work it into me. I spread my legs wide, wiping my hand on my discarded sweatshirt, then rested my arms on the worn oak tabletop.

  Zan took hold of his cock and pressed the tip to my opening, then slid it into me. I gasped, my body adjusting to the sudden invasion as my cock swelled and jumped. I absolutely loved the way he took me, as if being inside me was vital and urgent. He fucked me the same way, thrusting forcefully, his body slapping my ass with each down-stroke as he grasped my hips.

  I clung to the edges of the table with both hands to brace myself and cried out incoherently as he pounded my prostate, overwhelmed with pleasure, my cock throbbing. Again and again he pushed himself into me, his moans mingling with mine, a primal chorus in the otherwise quiet cabin. Zan bent over, wrapping his arms around my body as he fucked me wildly, pulling me onto him even as I drove myself back onto his big, thick cock.

  My orgasm detonated with little warning and I yelled as I shot all over the underside of the table, pushing back hard, trying to get him into me as deep as I possibly could. After a few more thrusts that rocked me and the solid table beneath us, Zan cried out and began cumming in me. He slammed into my body, over and over, and it was so fucking perfect, rough and wild, claiming me, showing me I was his more profoundly than words ever could.

  By the time those massive orgasms ebbed, my energy was utterly depleted and I was sweating and gasping for breath. He cleaned up quickly with some paper towels (both us and the underside of the table) then pulled me down onto the kitchen floor with him. As we both sprawled out on our backs, he entwined his hand with mine and asked, “You okay?” I nodded, too spent to speak. He rolled onto his side and draped his arm over me, the fingers of his other hand still tangled with mine.

  After a minute he said, “I intended to be gentler this time. I’m sorry, I—”

  I interrupted him with a kiss and said, “You did exactly what I wanted. Please don’t apologize. I’d hate it if you fucked me like I was some breakable little thing.”

  “You drive me absolutely wild, Gianni,” he said, curling up against me and draping his leg over mine. “I can’t comprehend how any one person could be so sweet, sexy and beautiful, all at the same time.” I grinned at the compliment, letting my eyes slide shut.

  When I shivered a bit as the sweat cooled on my skin, Zan was up like a shot. “You’re cold, love. Come with me, let’s warm you up again.”

  I let him pull me to my feet, and we went into the main room of the cabin. It was incredibly cozy, with cedar walls and floors, plaid curtains at the big windows, and lots of little folk art trinkets, including a series of hand-carved wooden fish that seemed to swim along the mantel, weaving among family photos and other treasures. Zan spread a blanket on top of the rug in front of the big river rock fireplace, then dropped a couple pillows onto it. After I settled in, he draped another blanket over me, then got busy building a fire.

  I watched him as he worked, the muscles in his arms and shoulders flexing as he piled wood into the hearth. When his dark hair swung to the side, I got a glimpse of a big, round tattoo between his shoulder blades. I’d spotted it before, but had never gotten a good look.

  After he started the fire and sat back on his heels to watch it, I brushed his thick hair over his left shoulder, then traced the outline of the tattoo with my fingertip. It was an incredibly intricate Celtic knot about eight inches in diameter, dozens of lines interwoven gracefully in a perfectly symmetrical pattern. “This is incredibly beautiful,” I murmured.

  “Thanks. I forget it’s there half the time.”

  “What’s the story behind it?”

  He shifted around so he was facing me and pulled the blanket up over my shoulders. “It’s stupid, the wistfulness of a much younger me. I don’t know if I should tell you. Generally, I find stories making me sound like a sap are best avoided.”

  “It won’t be sappy. Just tell me.”

  He looked down at his hands, which were smoothing out a corner of the blanket, and said, “It had to do with the idea of home and family, especially my mum, and to a lesser extent, my dad. He was crap as a father, but he was still a part of me, like it or not.” Zan sighed and looked into the fire, which was just beginning to catch. “I’d been so lost in my early twenties. I’d had my first number-one pop hit, which was already overwhelming, and on top of that, my agent had convinced me to move to America to help boost my career. I felt completely adrift, and...I don’t know. I guess I got the tattoo to remind myself that all of that was still a part of me, my mum and dad and England and everything I missed so profoundly. It was all interwoven, like the pattern in that tattoo, coming together to form who I was. I wanted to remind myself that I carried all of that with me, no matter where I went or how alone I felt.”

  “Didn’t your mom come with you when you moved to the U.S.?”

  “Nah. She’d gotten married the year before and stayed behind to be with her new husband. She’d toured with me all throughout my childhood and teens, but figured I was grown up by that point and didn’t need her anymore.”

  “You mentioned once you’d been raised by a single mom,” I said gently. “What happened to your dad?”

  “Nothing happened to him. He just couldn’t bother to be a father to me, from the time I was born. He only came around when he wanted something, usually money. My mother’s a smart woman, but for some reason she had a huge blind spot where that man was concerned. She kept falling for his charm and wit and letting him come back, only to be hurt by him again and again. When I started earning money from my music, my father showed up with his hand out, wanting a piece of it. My mum would have none of that, and that was when she finally cut him out of our lives, once and for all.”

  “Is she still in England?”

  “Yeah. I bought her and her new family a lovely estate outside London. Her husband had been a widower with two kids. She raised them with him, then went on to dote on half a dozen grandbabies.”

  “Does she ever come see you?”

  He shook his head. “She hasn’t spoken to me in years. I hear about what she’s up to from my law
yer. He sends me twice-yearly updates on all my financial matters and always includes a paragraph on my mum. They’ve gotten to be friends over the years.”

  “Why doesn’t your mother speak to you?” I asked.

  “She was furious that I walked away from that concert, and became even angrier as I stayed away all those years. She felt I’d thrown away everything she and I had worked for, and called me ungrateful and spoiled. When I told her I’d almost had a breakdown, she added weak and pathetic to my list of faults. She demanded I pull myself up by my bootstraps, get my shite together and get back out there, and when I told her I couldn’t, she stopped speaking to me.”

  I stared at him, totally dumbfounded. “How could she do that? You didn’t choose to have a breakdown, and you dealt with it the best you could.”

  “But you just don’t do that in our family. The expression keep calm and carry on could have been coined specifically for the Tillanes. You don’t give in to your problems, you ignore them, pretend everything’s fine and keep moving forward. I bought into that for years, actually, before I reached my breaking point.”

  “I’m so sorry she did that to you,” I told him.

  Zan grinned, but it didn’t mask the sadness in his eyes. “Come here, love,” he said, holding an arm out to me. I pivoted around so I was curled against him and pulled the blanket over both of us as he hugged me. “I apologize for going off on that long, awkward tangent. I should have just said I got the tattoo on a lark and left it at that. I’d never tried to explain the why of it to anyone before, and apparently my answer was as convoluted as the design.”

  “I’m so glad you explained it to me.”

  He kissed me softly, then rested his forehead against mine as he murmured, “My sweet, beautiful Gianni.” I climbed onto his lap, straddling him and hugging him as he stroked my hair and kissed me again.

  We built each other back up gradually, with soft kisses and caresses. The fire crackled and warmed our naked bodies as the sun began to set outside, bathing us and the room in golden light. I lowered myself onto Zan’s hard cock, then rode him slowly as I looked into his handsome face. He smiled up at me blissfully, his eyes sparkling as laugh lines formed in their corners.

  He’d never believe me, but I liked the subtle signs of aging on him. Zan had survived, making it this far despite so much pain and personal struggle. It broke my heart to think he’d been so close to suicide at one point, but he’d found his way out of the darkness. Every line and grey hair was a testament to all those extra years he’d given himself, and I loved what they represented.

  I began to ride him harder and he exhaled and tilted his head back, his eyes sliding shut. It felt really good and my cock was throbbing, but I ignored it and concentrated on his pleasure. He didn’t, though, and took my erection in his big hand, stroking me rhythmically. This went on for a long time, both of us savoring each other.

  I came before he did, spraying his chest, and a minute later he came too, bucking up into me as he cried out. I kept riding him through to the end, slowing gradually and finally stilling. Afterwards, I cleaned him up with some nearby tissues and laid down on top of him, propped up with my elbows so I didn’t put too much weight on him, and he wrapped his arms around me. I tried to remain very still so his cock didn’t slip from me. “Thank you, Alexzander,” I whispered.

  “Thank you too, love.” The sun was down by then, the sky outside the big windows a gorgeous indigo blue. He pulled a blanket over both of us, and after a while he asked gently, “Can I ask why you do that? Use my full name, I mean. You did it once before when we were having sex.”

  I thought about that and said quietly, “I guess it’s because, to all the world, you’re Zan. But when you’re fucking me, you’re nobody else’s in that moment, you’re only mine. Nobody calls you Alexzander, so that’s my special piece of you, the part no one else can have, at least for now.”

  “What do you mean, for now?”

  “I’m not kidding myself,” I said softly. “I know you’ll tire of me just like everyone else does, and you’ll move on. I want you to know I won’t be angry and resentful when you do that. I’ll completely understand.”

  He shifted a bit, and his cock slid from me. I hated the sudden feeling of emptiness. “Why would you expect me to move on from you?”

  “Well, see, I was thinking about this earlier. When you were isolated at your house, I was literally the only one for you because you had no other options. But you’re back out in the world now. You’re going to meet so many people, and you’ll find someone much better suited to you than I am.”

  “What does that mean, someone better suited to me?”

  I wasn’t looking at him, my head on his shoulder as I said, “You know. Someone like you. Someone talented and successful and interesting. I realized earlier, when I was watching you sing, that you and I are practically two different species, and someone like me can’t expect to hold your interest for long.” When he didn’t say anything, I snuck a look at him. Zan was staring at me incredulously.

  He sat up, taking me with him so I was on my knees with his thighs between my legs, and exclaimed, “How the bloody hell could you possibly come up with the idea that it’s you that’s somehow not good enough for me? I’m a forty-eight-year-old has-been. I’m so fucking cracked that I just spent the last decade in isolation because I couldn’t fucking deal with anything! But you’re not good enough for me? How could you possibly arrive at that conclusion?”

  I knit my brows at him. “How many has-beens have news helicopters stalking them, and hundreds of people flocking to get a glimpse of them?”

  “That’s just because I stirred up all that drama with my disappearing act. I’m such a freak show that people can’t help but be curious.”

  I got up, stepping back from him as I wrapped the blanket around myself. My voice rose as I said, “Oh, come on! You saw those people on TV. They fucking adore you.”

  He stood up too, unashamedly naked as he put his hands on his hips. “Why are you getting angry? I didn’t ask for any of that. And I’m sure as hell not looking to fucking move on from you so I can bed half my fan base, if that’s what you’re somehow thinking!”

  “Well, why not? You could do that easily.”

  “Why not?” he yelled. “Why not? Because I’m totally fucking in love with you, Gianni Dombruso!”

  I blinked at him. “You’re...what?”

  “You heard me. I’ve been in love with you for months, Gianni. I tried to talk myself out of it, because it seemed completely daft that a gorgeous, intelligent, absolutely extraordinary twenty-nine-year-old would want anything whatsoever to do with me. But no matter how much I tried to distance myself and push you away, you kept doing the sweetest things, like busting your cute little arse on my blasted landscaping, because you were worried about what would happen to me in a fucking wildfire. Who does that? Who shows so much concern for someone that gives them nothing in return?”

  “I...I really didn’t want your house to burn down. I was afraid you’d stay there and burn with it,” I murmured. I was still staring at him, still trying to make sense of this conversation. “You love me?”

  Zan raised an eyebrow. “How can this possibly be news to you? I left my house for the first time in thirteen fucking years, rode a damned lawnmower, and plunged myself into one of the world’s busiest airports so I could find you. What the bloody hell did you think my message was after all that? I’m somewhat keen on you?”

  “I...guess so?”

  “I wasn’t going to tell you this. I wanted to play it cool. But there’s only one thing that would have made me do any of that, Gianni. Love. For the first time in my long, bollocksed life, I’m in love. And I don’t know what to do, because I have absolutely no experience with this! I feel like a teenager, all stupid and awkward. I want to write you a bleedin’ love song and bring you flowers and leave a note in your locker that says: Will you be my boyfriend? Check the box, yes or no. But that’s fucking insane,
because I’m forty-fucking-eight years old, and my God I wish I’d stop talking, because the more I say the stupider it sounds! But I can’t seem to make myself shut up! I love you so fucking much that it hurts. It physically hurts! What the fuck is that? I have an actual ache in my chest when I’m around you! I thought I was having a bloody heart attack at first, which at my age is a cause for alarm! And suddenly, holy hell, all the songs are about you! I was listening to this CD my son bought me a few weeks ago, and I fucking started weeping at a song called So Beautiful, because it reminded me of you. Who does that? And dear God, Gianni, if you care for me at all, you’ll make me shut up because I can’t seem to do it myself!”

  I dropped the blanket and closed the distance between us, my lips meeting his as I grabbed him in an embrace. We kissed passionately, desperately, and when we finally came up for air, I whispered, “I love you, too.”

  He tried to look away, turning his head embarrassedly and muttering, “You don’t have to say that, just because I did.”

  I took hold of his chin and turned his head so he was looking at me again. “I’m saying it because it’s true. I love you, Alexzander.”

  “But...how?”

  I grinned at that and rested my forehead against his. “I always had feelings for you, and I realized just how deep they went when I saw you at the airport. I was both elated that you’d come for me and completely terrified for you. When I realized all you’d gone through to get to me, I was overcome. I still can’t believe you did that for me.”

  “I’d do anything for you, Gianni. Absolutely anything,” he said, and I kissed him, lightly at first, but it never stayed that way for long.

  We both ended up totally aroused once again, and he laid me on my back in front of the fireplace, watching me closely as he took me. I smiled at him, and the smile I got in return was glorious. After he came in me, Zan slid down my body and sucked me until I climaxed. Afterwards, all I could do was grin and fall asleep in his arms.