by Witt, L. A.
Jesse guided himself to me. The pressure increased slowly, both of us taking long breaths as we waited for me to relax enough to take him.
“Oh God,” he groaned even before I’d yielded to him. “This is . . . gonna be fast . . .”
I just nodded, leaning back against him, eyes watering as the head of his cock started to slide past the tight ring. I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t see. Could barely breathe. It wasn’t just from the intense burn, though. It had just been so long. Too long. I’d been overwhelmed tonight by lips on mine and hands on skin and the weight of another man on top of me. Taking him inside me, knowing he wanted me—it was hard not to get emotional as too many months of physical isolation came to an end.
Jesse groaned again as he pushed deeper. He withdrew a little, then eased in farther, and the slide of his cock made my spine tingle. I couldn’t tell if he was moving slowly to tease me or to keep from hurting me, but it had both effects. The stretch was intense, but not unpleasant, and the slowness drove me insane with the need to be fucked hard and fast.
“More,” I finally croaked. “C’mon.”
“More?” His hands drifted up and down my back, and he was panting already. “You want it hard?”
I nodded. “Please.”
“Oh, baby,” he murmured as he slowly withdrew. “I’m so not kidding—this is gonna be fast.”
“Bring it.”
He made a sound that might’ve been a laugh or just a delirious moan, but before I could give it much thought, he thrust into me, nearly knocking my arms out from under us. He did it again. And again. My arms weren’t going to hold us up, but I didn’t care. Every time he buried his dick inside me, I unraveled a little more, and I wanted to shatter. The pleasure was overwhelming, almost excruciating, and every thrust added more intensity, like layers of electricity, if such a thing were possible.
I squeezed my eyes shut, and a few hot tears slid down my face. Not just from the physical sensations, either. For months, I’d been constantly aware of that deep, painful sense of loss, but tonight was the first time I was aware of my grief like this. It seemed to be falling away, pieces sliding off my shoulders with every thrust like plaster knocked off a wall by a headboard.
There’s life after all that grief, something seemed to be telling me.
Yes. Yes, there was. And holy fuck, after feeling like shit for so long . . .
“Oh God!” I cried out. “That’s so . . . so good.”
He whimpered. Then he slowed down. His weight shifted, and he pressed me down onto my stomach, and he stayed with me, molding his body to mine. Once we’d settled onto the mattress, he started moving again, rocking his hips as he kissed the back of my neck along my hairline. The soft brush of his lips turned me on as much as the slow, deep strokes he was taking inside me.
“Fuck,” he moaned. “I’m . . . close, but I don’t want . . . yet . . .”
“Want you to come.” I pressed my forehead into the sheets. “Then we can do it again.”
He swore against my neck and thrust just a little bit harder, his body shaking all over as he forced himself into me. My eyes welled up again as he moved. I was so close to coming, but as I fought back the tears, it kept my orgasm at bay too, and I couldn’t breathe as I rode that line, as I hovered on the edge of breaking in every way, and then Jesse moaned in my ear, “Oh fuck, I’m gonna come.”
I moaned too, my own climax closing in fast as his voice and body shook with arousal. I screwed my eyes shut, squeezing a few hot tears free in the same instant my orgasm jolted through me. I gasped, swore, and then he was burying his face against my neck and fucking me harder, deeper, riding me with erratic and needy thrusts until a hot breath rushed past my neck, and he shuddered.
Jesse sagged over me and exhaled. “Fuck . . .”
“Yeah. Fuck.” I pressed my forehead into the mattress, struggling to catch my breath. “That was . . . so good.”
“Uh-huh.” He kissed my neck just below my hair and sucked in a sharp hiss as one last shudder rippled through him.
Then we were still. Just lying there. Just breathing. His skin was sweaty and feverishly hot, and mine probably was too, and I was pretty sure I could feel his heart pounding right alongside mine.
“You okay?” he murmured.
“Way more than okay.”
“Good.” He kissed behind my ear and pulled out, but he didn’t get up. Instead, he burrowed against my neck again. “For what it’s worth, I’m really glad you came by the shop.”
The words jarred something in me. Everything from the last couple of days seemed like they’d been a dream or something I’d seen in a movie. The guilt, shame, and panic were distant memories. The nervousness about him confronting me? Gone. It was like this—panting and sweating in his bed—had been inevitable, but it hadn’t been. One wrong word or lapse in courage, or Jesse not changing his mind after tossing the note, and tonight wouldn’t have happened.
Somehow, everything had gone right, and we’d found our way to this.
“Yeah.” I reached back to stroke his hair. “Me too.”
* * *
Neither of us moved for a little while. We’d gotten out of his bed long enough to clean ourselves up, but ever since then, we’d just been lying here, kissing lazily and soaking up the afterglow. At one point, I thought he’d drifted off. I might’ve dozed myself.
“Still awake?” he asked.
I nodded, then pressed a kiss to his shoulder. “Mm-hmm.”
“Me too.” He paused. “Can I ask you something?” There was a hint of nerves in his voice. If I hadn’t been fully awake before, I was now.
“About?”
He swallowed. “About your husband?”
My stomach somersaulted hard. “Um. Yeah. I guess?” I wasn’t sure how that topic would affect the mood in the room right now, but I supposed there was nothing wrong with us being open and honest about things. “Go ahead.”
Jesse shifted onto his side and lifted himself up on his elbow. “I’m just curious about him. Most guys I’ve dated, they’ve got exes, you know? And they’re usually talking catty shit about them.” He trailed his knuckles up my chest. “I’ve never been with someone who lost a partner the way you did. I guess . . . like I said, I guess I’m curious about him.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Well . . .” His eyes lost focus for a second. “I guess the basics. How did you guys meet?”
I couldn’t help smiling fondly at the memory. “We worked together, actually.”
“So he was a bartender?”
“No, no.” I shook my head. “I was an accountant before.”
Jesse’s eyebrows shot up. “No shit?”
“Why is that so hard to believe?”
“I don’t know. I guess . . . I mean, I’ve only seen you as a bartender.” He looked me up and down as he ran a fingertip across my stomach. “I’m trying to imagine all this wrapped up in a shirt and tie with a pocket protector and—”
I laughed and batted his hand away playfully. “Shut up. I did not wear a pocket protector.”
“But . . . you’re not saying no to the shirt and tie?”
“Shirt. Tie. Glasses. The works.” I rolled my eyes. “I was an accountant and I looked the part.”
“You wear glasses?”
“Mm-hmm.”
He looked a little closer. “Ah. Contacts. Never noticed them before.” A soft smile—a shy one—spread across his lips. “Now I want to see you in your glasses.”
I laughed. “You’ll get your chance, I’m sure.”
“Good.” He paused, then shook his head. “Anyway. I’m sorry. I . . . Crap, now I kind of feel like an ass. I was asking you about something serious, and—”
“It’s okay.” I slid my hand up his arm. “This is kind of nice, actually. It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to talk to someone about him without focusing on . . .” I swallowed. “Focusing on the end.”
“That must’ve been rough.”
“Really? Why not?”
I laughed. “Because he was way too fucking chipper at eight o’clock staff meetings.”
“Oh my God.” Jesse drew back, a hand to his chest and expression so horrified, I might as well have told him Sean had been a serial killer. “That’s . . . ew.”
“Exactly. Plus I took my drab, serious accountant persona seriously, and he was the exact opposite. Sean was . . . he was one of those people who came into a room, and you knew he was there. He wasn’t loud or obnoxious, but he wasn’t exactly a wallflower either. And that just grated on my nerves.” I paused, then added, “He called himself the Queen of Marketing.”
“Like, queen of the department? Or the entire profession?”
I thought about that for a second. “He’d probably say both.”
“So what changed?” He paused. “I mean, if you don’t mind talking about it.”
“I don’t. Like I said, this is nice.” I took a breath and gazed up at the ceiling. “When our company hit its twenty-fifth anniversary, they took us out on one of those cruises in Puget Sound. I was, um, a little drunk.”
“I’m going to guess you were more than ‘a little’ drunk.”
“Oh, I was.” I chuckled, rolling my eyes. “I don’t drink much now, but I did back then. And there was an open bar. And I was surrounded by people who annoyed me.”
“I can see why you were drinking.”
“Yep. So there I was, grumpily getting shit-faced, and the next thing I know, Sean and I are on one of the outside decks, and I suddenly forgot he wasn’t my type at all. Next thing after that, we were fucking in one of the restrooms.”
Jesse’s eyebrows shot up. “Really?”
My cheeks burned as I nodded. “Yep. Once I was drunk enough not to be annoyed by him or anyone else, I realized that good God, that man was hot.”
“Nice,” Jesse said with a soft chuckle.
I couldn’t help grinning. “It was a little awkward at work on Monday, and we kind of avoided each other for a couple of days. Which wasn’t too hard—it was a small building, but we didn’t have to interact all that much. Then he came into my office and said we should clear the air. One very fast blowjob later, the air was definitely cleared.”
“Wow. He came in and blew you at work?”
“Actually, I blew him.”
Jesse straightened. “Really?”
I laughed. “Why is that such a shock? You don’t think I like sucking dick?”
He shivered. “It’s not that. Just . . . I don’t know. I guess I have a hard time imagining you as the type to suck a guy off at work. Or maybe because if we worked together, I’d be fantasizing about sucking you off in your office.”
It was my turn to shiver, which made Jesse grin.
“Anyway,” I said. “We realized we liked fooling around, and it didn’t take long for us to realize we liked each other too. A lot. It sounds crazy, but it wasn’t two weeks before I knew I’d marry him.” A pang of panic mixed with guilt hit me in the gut. I was in bed with another man telling him it was practically love at first fuck with someone else? Would this make things awkward?
But Jesse smiled. “That’s kind of sweet, actually. And you were right.”
“Yeah, I was.” The guilt eased as I realized Jesse wasn’t put off, and the more I thought about it, the more I also realized how good it was to be able to talk about Sean without feeling like my chest was going to crack open. The fact that I was naked in bed with another man seemed like it should’ve made me feel like an asshole, but it didn’t. It was weirdly comforting, actually. Like a huge step forward. I wasn’t at home wallowing in my grief, and I wasn’t pretending Sean had never existed. Instead I’d found a happy medium that I hadn’t imagined was possible. One where Sean was still gone, but I was still living my life. Still enjoying my life. The void he’d left would never completely close, but it felt less like something that would swallow me up and consume me.
“So, Sean wasn’t your type?”
I shook my head. “Nope.”
“So . . . what is?”
“Well, prior to him, I was always into really, really masculine types. I had a thing for bikers and military guys, and I had a perma-hard-on for the guys renovating my apartment in college.”
Jesse grinned. “You have good taste. Did the workers on your apartment at least have the decency to walk around shirtless?”
“More often than not.” I shivered at the memory. “Fuck, they were hot.”
“Sounds like it.” He trailed his fingers along my thigh and offered a devilish smile. “Are you not into guys like that anymore? Or did Sean just open your eyes to what it’s like to be with someone this fabulous?”
Even as I laughed, a knot grew in my stomach. I turned onto my side, facing Jesse, and slid a hand over his waist. “He’s the reason I decided a guy didn’t have to be six feet of hairy muscles to be attractive, yes.” I smiled despite that knot and pulled him a little closer. “But I’m pretty sure a certain hot, ballsy blond strutting into the Alehouse would’ve caught my eye no matter what.”
He laughed too but seemed slightly uneasy. “Oh yeah?”
“Mm-hmm.” I made an emphatic gesture of running my hand up and down his side and his smooth abs, and when he shivered, I murmured, “You think I’d have missed out on this?”
Jesse bit his lip, squirming under my touch. “I’m glad you didn’t. ’Cause I like what you do with it.”
“Me too. And to be serious, I do find you very attractive. On your own, not just because of him.”
He was quiet for a moment, watching his own hand drift along my arm. “When you’re with me, do you think about him or me?”
“You.” I paused. “I mean, I won’t lie and say he doesn’t cross my mind all the time, but that happens whether you’re there or not.” I cupped his face gently. “But if you’re asking who I’ve been wanting for the last few days, and who I hope is coming in whenever the Alehouse door opens . . . no question. It’s you.”
He searched my eyes, and his smile slowly formed. “That’s all I need to know, then.” He lifted his head, kissed me softly, and then rested it on the pillow again. “I don’t want you to forget him or not think about him. Just as long as you’re thinking of me as me and not ‘that guy who’s kind of like him.’”
“Not at all.” I grinned cautiously. “Pretty sure you’re one of a kind anyway. You’re amazing.”
Jesse clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes. “Please.” He pretended to buff his nails on a shirt he wasn’t wearing. “I’m awesome.”
I snorted. “Yes. Yes, you are.” We shared a long, lazy kiss, and though that knot had still set up shop in my gut, it wasn’t so tight now. I hadn’t lied to Jesse—Sean was on my mind a lot, but when we were together, it was all about Jesse. I wanted him, and even if I’d been all about hypermasculine men in my younger days, I couldn’t imagine ever not being attracted to this sexy, feisty man.
After a moment, I drew back and met his gaze. “So while we’re talking about heavy personal things, can I ask you something?”
Jesse rested his palm in the middle of my chest. “I’d be kind of a hypocrite if I said no, don’t you think?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know about that.”
“Either way—shoot.”
I studied him for a moment, then softly asked, “How long have you been positive?”
Jesse’s lips tightened and his eyes flicked away from mine for a second. “Since I was sixteen.”
I stared at him. “You’ve . . . had it since you were a kid?”
He nodded. “I got it from a boyfriend in high school. Tested positive two weeks before my seventeenth birthday.” Sighing, he shifted around. “Happy birthday to me.”
“So, you didn’t go years without it being
detected. That’s a good thing, right?”
Jesse shrugged. “It’s good because then I could get it treated and under control faster, but the irony of it is that I was diagnosed early because my doc was a homophobic jackass.”
I raised my eyebrows. “How do you figure?”
He shifted again, perching on his arm like he was settling in for a lengthy story. “I got sick, and at first everyone thought it was the flu. But it wouldn’t go away, so my mom took me to the doctor. She was terrified I had mono, but the doc figured since I was such a beacon of heterosexuality that he should test me for”—Jesse made air quotes—“‘everything.’”
I cocked my head. “He didn’t actually make that beacon comment, did he?”
“Not out loud, but I could tell by his attitude. My sexuality was visible from space even back then, so it’s not like it took a rocket scientist to put two and two together. He asked if I was sexually active—and, oh my God, he was so disgusted when he asked—and I was too embarrassed to admit it in front of my mom. Besides, my boyfriend and I had broken up, so it technically wasn’t a lie.” He rolled his eyes. “Anyway, he took some blood, and when the results came back, he was the only one who wasn’t surprised.”
“Just because you’re gay?” I growled.
“Yes and no.” Jesse huffed out a breath and rolled onto his back, putting a hand behind his head and looking up at the ceiling. “I guess the symptoms I had are kind of a red flag. Muscle pain, swollen lymph glands, being fucking tired all the time—it’s acute retroviral syndrome. When the virus is, like, settling in and the body is going haywire.”
“Huh. I never realized it showed symptoms at all that early.”
“It doesn’t with everyone.” He smirked. “Guess I was lucky—symptomatic HIV and an apparently not-so-subtle penchant for sucking dick. The perfect storm to get my doctor to test me.”
“I guess homophobia is useful once in a while.”
“Right?” Jesse chuckled softly but didn’t meet my gaze.
I cupped his face and traced his cheekbone with the pad of my thumb. “I assume you’ve been treated since then too?”