Loved by Him (Rough Love Book 5)

by Leighton Greene

  “Thirty. And yeah,” Dorian sighs regretfully. “He said it was good stuff, but I guess I should’ve known better. Never trust a surfer. That’s what my mom always said.”

  “She…did?”

  “I mean, she would have, if she said that kind of thing.” He has hummus smeared across his cheek.

  “Wait – surfer?” Ben stares at Dorian. “Was he all, like, golden and beautiful but annoying at the same time?”

  Dorian considers. “Yes. Yes, he was. Man, I am actually really, really stoned. Don’t try to talk to me right now, I’ll just be annoying. That’s what my mom always said.”

  Joe comes in with more empty trays. “Went down well,” he says to Ben, nodding at the trays.

  But Ben has lost all interest in the salmon things. “Joe, is that guy, that Adam guy – did he get invited? Is he here?”

  He frowns. “Probably. He usually shows up. I never really know who asks him.” He sees Ben’s face. “I’ll ask him to leave. Politely, or not so much? Your choice. Personally, I think there are some guys who just look a lot better with a fist in their face. Why are you laughing?”

  “You’re pretty different to Xander, that’s all. And it’s okay. I’ll handle it.”

  Adam, when Ben finds him, is in the pool out back. His body is all bronzed and taut in the fading sunlight, and he’s bobbing in the water smoking a joint, laughing at a joke. Ben stands at the side of the pool for a while, watching him, before Adam sees him and grins. He hands off the joint and swims over.

  “Ben, yeah?” He pulls himself half up out of the water to fold his arms on the poolside. “You coming in?”

  Ben shakes his head no, and Adam smiles. “Guess you can’t. Marks, right? Oh, hey – awesome salmon things, man.”

  Ben crouches down. “Thanks,” he says. “I’m glad you enjoyed them. They were Xander’s favorite too.”

  “How is that boy? Looking forward to New York, New York?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you?” The setting sun fires across his face, his lazy grin reflecting red.

  “We have it sorted out.” Ben is surprised to find that he’s not angry. “You know what, Adam? I would say I’m sorry things didn’t work out for you two, but it’s your loss.”

  Adam flicks his wet hair out of his eyes, watching drops of water hit Ben in the face. But Ben doesn’t even blink, just wipes them off.

  “It’s like that, huh?” Adam asks.

  “It’s like that.”

  “You’ve seen him? How he gets?”

  “Yeah. I have.”

  They look at each other, and then Adam blinks, shrugs. “Your funeral,” he says.

  “Do me a favor? Don’t go anywhere near him tonight.”

  Adam’s face is as blank and pleasant as ever as he thinks about it. “You owe me one,” he says eventually. He holds out his hand, but Ben can’t bring himself to shake it.

  “I’ll owe you,” he says instead. All he feels is pity, but he’s ashamed to admit to himself that it’s pleasing. “Enjoy the party.”

  “I don’t want to go,” Xander groans in the car. “Everyone loves me here.”

  “They’ll love you there as well.”

  “Those salmon things really were amazing.”

  “I know.” Ben smirks. “Now I just need to get pasta down.”

  “Never gonna happen, Ballard. You need heart for pasta, not just stomach.”

  “Bite me.”

  “That’s the plan,” Xander says lightly, trailing his fingers up Ben’s thigh. “Drive faster.”

  Xander’s apartment feels strange. He’s packed away his personal things and tomorrow night Ben is going to meet a friend of Xander’s to hand over the keys for extended house-sitting. Noah and Henry are gone, too. Even the plastered hole has been painted over now. They did it together one Friday night, although more paint ended up on them than the wall.

  “You were teasing me tonight,” Xander says, when they reach the bedroom. “Feeding me. Telling me to be good.”

  “Yep,” Ben says with a bright smile. “It was fun to watch.”

  Xander smiles back. “Take your clothes off, Benjamin,” he says softly. “And do it slowly. Look nervous, like you used to.”

  Ben doesn’t have to fake the nervousness. He can’t stop looking at the knife, still on the nightstand. They’ve agreed that he’ll take it while Xander is gone. Xander’s gaze doesn’t leave him for a second as he strips. His eyes stray from the now-pale pink lines on Ben’s chest to the finger mark bruises on his hips that recur every few days.

  “Will you miss looking like this?” Xander asks.

  “Yeah,” Ben says, his heart hurting. “Yeah, I will.”

  “I wanted to leave you some marks to remember me by, at least for a while,” Xander says. “But everything’s at your place.” Ben feels so disappointed and annoyed that he wants to sulk. He told Xander they should keep something here for tonight, but Xander refused. “Don’t look at me like that,” Xander admonishes. “I’ll still take care of you. I always do, don’t I? Stand up against the wall, facing it. Hands up, out of the way.”

  Ben complies, and feels Xander’s hand against his back, sweeping down into the curve above his ass and then down over his cheeks, squeezing lightly. “You are so fucking gorgeous,” Xander says, and Ben stops himself from nodding. He feels gorgeous, like this.

  Xander doesn’t even warn him before bringing his hand down, hard, on his ass, and Ben jolts. Xander hasn’t done this for a while.

  “It’s been a while,” Xander says, echoing his thoughts. Oh, God, Ben thinks. He really is a mind reader. “But Dorian was staring at your ass all night, so it was hard to resist.”

  “Dorian?” Ben asks. “That kid can freaking bite my ass.”

  Xander slaps said ass again. “Forget about Dorian.” Ben can hear the laugh in his voice.

  “Done,” Ben breathes.

  Xander spanks him with increasing force until Ben’s ass is kind of numb, and then on fire again, and his dick is rubbing painfully into the wall each time he bucks forward. Xander moves close behind him, rubbing his jeans into the raw skin. “Does it hurt?”

  “It stings like a bi– Ow!” Ben convulses as Xander scratches his nails, hard, into his skin.

  This is Xander’s favorite kind of play. Hands-on and hands-heavy, except for his teeth, and maybe the knife, Ben thinks. But as he glances to the nightstand, he realizes that it’s gone, and his muscles tense.

  Xander scratches up and down his back, slowly dragging his nails until Ben’s breath catches in a whimper. That’s the noise he’s listening for, and when it comes, Xander starts biting instead. Unpleasant little nips, sharp pains all across Ben’s shoulders and upper back. Xander threads his arms around Ben’s torso to pinch unforgiving welts into his flesh, twists at his nipples until Ben yelps and tries to move away.

  “Talk,” Xander says. “I want to hear you try to talk this time.”

  Ben tries to make sentences, but it’s mostly a jumble of Oh fuck please yes with I love you and I wish you didn’t have to go tangled up around his tongue. Xander grabs at his cock and slowly, too slowly, strokes it in his hand, until the only noises coming out of Ben’s mouth are approximations of begging.

  “Not yet,” Xander says. “I want my fun too.” He turns Ben to face him and kisses him. Ben is pretty sure that panting straight into Xander’s mouth like he’s doing is not particularly sexy, but he can’t help it, and Xander won’t let him go.

  By the time he does, Ben’s breathing has slowed. “Remember the first time you sucked me?” Xander asks. “You wanted to know if you were doing it right.” He laughs.

  “And how did I do?” Ben carefully keeps the petulance out of his voice.

  “You made up in effort what you lacked in technique.”

  “Well, golly gee, good to know,” Ben says, before he can stop himself. He can see Xander doesn’t like his tone. “S-sorry.”

  Thankfully Xander is in a generous mood. “Apology
accepted. But watch yourself. You want to cum, don’t you?”

  Ben nods, drops his eyes. He doesn’t really think Xander would fly to the other side of the country without getting him off, but Xander is…unpredictable.

  “Down on your knees,” Xander is saying. “Show me how much you’ve learned.” He unzips his jeans, moves them down a little and pulls out his cock, his other hand thumbing at Ben’s mouth. “Open wide for me.”

  Ben still feels like he’s not that great, even after all these months, but Xander’s fingers tightening in his hair and the way he moves his hips forward when Ben moves back suggest that at least he’s doing something right. He looks up to Xander’s face, sucking on the head of his cock, makes his eyes wide and innocent, and Xander groans, has to close his eyes at the sight. When he opens them, Ben sticks out his tongue as far as he can, cradling Xander’s length, then swallows him down.

  Hearing Xander’s whispered, “Oh, fuck,” only makes Ben more eager to please, but he finds himself dragged off by the hair, gasping for air.

  “Okay,” Xander says, his breath heavy. “You have learned some new tricks.”

  “There’s this website –” But Xander puts a finger over his lips to silence him.

  “Good boy.” Xander has that sardonic tone that he uses when Ben has done something actually helpful instead of intended as helpful. “You’ve earned a reward. Where would you like to be fucked? In bed, or here against the wall?”

  “Here,” Ben says immediately. In bed, he might get too emotional.

  “Alright,” Xander says, smiling as though he knows. “You can undress me now, if you like.”

  Ben drops to the floor again to start unlacing Xander’s shoes. Xander is compliant as Ben unbuttons and unzips and untucks; sometimes he likes to make Ben really work for it, but not tonight. But before Ben pulls down his jeans, Xander snaps his fingers.

  “Oh, right. I forgot.” He digs in his pocket, brings out the knife. “Okay. Continue.” Ben stares at it, at Xander’s fingers loosely curling around the handle. “I said, continue,” Xander reminds him. “Don’t worry about the knife. Not yet.”

  Ben darts his tongue out across his lips, and tugs at the jeans and briefs, trying to focus on Xander’s cock, hot and curved and shining wet at the tip, instead of the knife. But it’s always there, on the periphery. He feels his forehead warm, bead with sweat.

  When Xander shoves him up against the wall, that’s when Ben really starts worrying. Xander’s hand is flat on his back, pushing him into the unyielding plaster, and there is something cold and unpleasant between his skin and Xander’s palm: the knife. Ben holds very still, only moves when Xander moves him.

  “Are you scared?” Xander asks in his ear. Ben can feel the cold knife trailing up his spine. He can’t tell whether it’s open or closed. He’s hoping closed.

  “Yes,” he says. “Yes, I am scared.”

  “You know I’m not going to cut you. Not tonight.”

  “No. No, I don’t know.”

  Xander wraps his arms around Ben’s chest, immobilizing his arms, the knife – definitely closed, Ben is thankful to note – hard against his ribs, pushing in against him so that Ben thinks he’ll have a handle-shaped bruise tomorrow.

  “I’m not going to. But I want you to know that I could, if I wanted.”

  “I know that,” Ben whispers.

  “You take everything from me, Benjamin. You give up so much to me.” Xander is still holding him close, but one hand is down between them, pushing inside Ben’s ass, making him open up and relax. “It’s beautiful to watch.”

  When he fucks him, Xander lets him go under, fly away to wherever he goes; even Ben isn’t sure. Xander’s orgasm is obvious because he bites hard; pulls his mouth off before it’s too hard. When Ben starts coming back to himself, he’s on the bed, and Xander’s mouth is engulfing his dick. Xander swallows it all down when Ben shoots, too expert, more expert than Ben thinks he’ll ever be. But he’s not complaining, and Xander’s not complaining either.

  Somehow, with all their imperfections, they’re perfect for each other.

  “I thought you would...you know. Scare me again,” Ben says afterwards. “Like that time.”

  “Yeah. Then fly off to New York and leave you to pick up the pieces tomorrow.”

  “Oh. Right. I didn’t think of that.”

  “You never really do, Benjamin. Good thing I’m the one in control.” Xander sounds smug, but Ben can hardly argue with him.

  “Yeah, Xander. What a blessing,” he says, with only half the sarcasm he would normally use.

  “I forgot,” Xander says suddenly. “Look what I found.” He turns on the bedside lamp and reaches for one of the bags on the floor, yanking out some worn papers. “Remember this?”

  Ben looks at it, and starts laughing. “Yeah. My kink checklist.” He flicks through it, slightly embarrassed at his own former naïveté. “You weren’t very interested in it, as I recall. Why’d you keep it?”

  “Of course I was interested. And I think we’ve covered most of your picks,” Xander says, scooting closer to read beside him. “Not that one, though–” He points. “That would be interesting.”

  “I didn’t even know what it was when I chose it,” Ben groans, covering his face with a hand.

  “You’re adorable.”

  “You never filled one out. You said you would.”

  “I said I’d think about it. But as it happens, I did do one.” He turns the pages over and Ben can see that Xander has handwritten out his own list on the back, next to neatly blocked squares, each square checked precisely in the center.

  Every line of the list is an iteration of Ben’s name: Benjamin Ballard, Benjamin Charles Ballard, B C Ballard –

  “This isn’t a kink list,” Ben says. “It’s just – me.”

  Xander simply smiles.

  They lie content for a while. “So, what are you going to do?” Ben asks later. “You can’t go long without it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You can go maybe a month, max, before you need it again. This stuff. That’s the only reason I suggested the clubs that one time. I was trying to help.”

  Xander shifts next to him, and brings Ben’s knuckles up to his mouth to kiss. “I’ve lived with it for my whole life. I’m used to it. Also – you still don’t get it?”

  “What?”

  “It’s you. You make me kind of…It’s not as bad when you’re not around. It’s still there, the urge, but it’s not so bad. Easier for me to handle.”

  Ben stares. “Me – I – what?”

  Xander laughs. “I’m not trying to blame you or anything. You just – push my buttons, even when you don’t mean to. You just take it so well. So much. It’s kind of…frightening.”

  “But I thought–”

  “Benjamin, you think too much.”

  “Huh.” Ben lies back down, looking at the ceiling. “Well. Okay. Does that mean you’ll go easy on me when I come visit you in New York?”

  “Not on your life, Ballard.”

  Ben wakes up the next morning when Xander clambers on top of him, tugging down the sheets from his body.

  “What are you doing?” he asks the pillow sleepily.

  “I can’t understand a word you’re saying,” Xander replies, and continues tugging. “Nice ass, though. Don’t need eloquence with an ass like that, do you?”

  Ben forces himself awake. Xander has that tone in his voice, that hyperactive, slightly manic tone that usually precedes something – painful.

  “What are you doing?” he demands again. He feels something damp and cold on his skin, and bucks on the bed in surprise. “Xander!”

  “Something to remember me by,” Xander says, holding Ben down firmly with one hand in his lower back. He’s finished in seconds, and throws something on the pillow next to Ben’s face.

  Ben gives a muffled curse. “Xander, come on. We agreed. No more sharpies.”

  But Xander is laughing. Ben twists and t
ries to see, but can’t. Xander relents and hands him a shaving mirror.

  Ben stares for a minute or two, at the thick, black XR written on his left butt cheek. It’s small enough and low down enough so that it will be hidden even when Ben is only in his underwear. Xander is delighted with himself.

  “It’ll come off, eventually,” Ben says, trying to dampen him.

  “You’re going to replace it every couple of days so it doesn’t.”

  “I am?”

  “Yep. And I’ll check up on you, too. When you least expect it. So you’d better be good and do as I say. I will be demanding photographic evidence.”

  Ben smiles. “Okay. I’ll be good.” He stretches, his cock thick against the sheets. It’s pleasant. He wants time to slow down. “Did I say anything when I was flying yesterday?” He always asks these days. Most of the time Xander says he was quiet, but sometimes–

  “Yes.” But Xander distracts him before he can ask for specifics. It’s only later, once Xander has really gone and Ben is walking listlessly around his apartment, checking for any last things he should take back to his place or tidy up, that he sees a sheet of paper on the kitchen counter, with the sharpie lying across it.

  It was Whitman. It’s Xander’s neat but slanted handwriting, spiking up like it wants to crawl off the page but is kept too tightly confined.

  I am to think of you when I sit alone or wake at night alone,

  I am to wait, I do not doubt I am to meet you again,

  I am to see to it that I do not lose you.

  It won’t be too long, baby.

  XR

  PS Remember to use the sharpie!!

  “You do not fucking cry, Ballard,” Ben says to the empty room.

  Ben and Xander’s story continues in the novel:

  Obey the Rules

  Can’t get enough of Ben and Xander’s odyssey? Read the exclusive subscriber-only extra

  Safe Word

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