Elton pushed Caio away and took a deep breath. He didn’t look well.
“I think I need to eat something,” he said.
“Then let’s go down to get some dinner,” Diego suggested. “You can stay back,” he said to Caio. Then turned to Elton, “But you and I might as well get some talking done on the way.”
Elton still seemed afraid and unsure around them. Caio knew Diego wouldn’t do anything stupid, but it was clear Diego was still suspicious and didn’t want to leave Elton alone with Caio.
“I’ll give you some money,” Caio told him, but Diego shook his head.
“No, this is my treat. You paid for the ice cream,” Diego reasoned.
It seemed like their afternoon with the family was a lost memory, a time when things were a lot simpler.
Caio agreed to let Diego pay for him, and the unlikely duo of Elton and Diego left the room a minute later.
All alone Caio decided to take a shower, though he still had enough time to make sure Elton had told the truth. Caio went by the room where he’d been sleeping with Adônis and got the confirmation he needed when he saw that none of Adônis’ things were there.
For a short moment, Caio had been unsure about Elton’s story, but he didn’t have any doubts now.
If Elton indeed had told them the full truth, Caio and Diego had just stamped their passports to the final of the competition.
There was already a silver medal hanging on the wall of Caio’s home, and it was a dream to give it a golden companion. But there were still a lot of things in his head, and Caio wasn’t sure if he had the confidence to fight for it.
But as they say in Brazil, hope dies last.
DINNER was an awkward affair, but not in the way Caio expected. They were trying to avoid talking about the competition, because it was a complicated topic for all of them, so conversation was stilted at times. But it was liberating to finally have a roommate they could talk to, if only for a night.
They discussed old matches from the past and remembered some of the former Brazilian teams who had won medals at the Olympics. In the middle of that talk, Diego suggested the three of them take a picture to register the moment.
Back in their room, Caio and Diego went to their own beds. Caio could sense that Diego regarded him with a cautious gaze, but Caio preferred not to say anything. A night of quiet would give him some breathing room and a clear head so he could wake up the next day feeling better.
He took a while to fall asleep, but when he did, it wasn’t the best night he’d ever had.
In the next morning, everything was quiet—maybe too quiet. Caio followed his usual routine, and when Diego awakened, they left the room to grab breakfast in the dining hall. Caio was hyper-aware of the world around him, afraid of someone pointing at him, laughing in his face, but that kind of thing didn’t happen in the village.
The athletes had a lot more to do than spend their time caring about what happened with someone else’s life, especially because Caio was far from famous. Most of them didn’t know what had happened and probably didn’t read gossip sites.
“You know you don’t need to keep looking over your shoulder,” Diego said as they walked back to the accommodations to get their bags.
“I know. I’m just worried,” Caio said.
“About what?” Diego asked.
“Everything.”
He tried not to let doubt plague his thoughts, but Caio was always expecting a reaction from other people. And when they arrived at the arena to train, a sense of doom hovered above him. His control on the world felt meager, insufficient, just an illusion.
He was afraid that the image he’d constructed would go up in smoke, and then he’d have to start all over again, and he wasn’t sure he was strong enough.
As he walked through the gates, he saw Adônis right in the middle of the main plaza, as though he’d been waiting for Caio.
A part of Caio wanted to jump Adônis and do unspeakable things to him, but he knew better.
He shouldn’t have expected the same control from Diego, who advanced toward Adônis with sure steps, dangerously pulling an arm back. Caio managed to grab the offending hand and stop Diego from doing something he’d regret.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Diego shouted into Adônis’s face. It was still early in the morning, so there weren’t a lot of people around, but those that were there stopped to watch the show.
Adônis didn’t back down.
“What is your problem?” he asked, fearless and head held high.
“You’re disgusting.”
Adônis just smirked.
Diego huffed out a breath beside Caio, who still hadn’t found his words. “I wish Elton hadn’t withdrawn, because I wanted to end you on the court,” Diego added. And as soon as he said the word withdrawn, Adônis stepped back, surprised.
“He did what?” he asked, losing control of his temper for a moment.
“You don’t know?” Diego taunted him and relaxed. Beside him, Caio could also do the same, even though he didn’t remove his hands from around Diego’s torso.
“I can’t believe…. That stupid virgin. I’m going to kill him.” Adônis had a furious look on his face.
“You’re not going to do anything to him.” Caio stepped up to make Adônis look at him.
“The president is going to destroy his career.” Adônis shook his head as he said the words.
“Like he did to mine?” Caio provoked. Adônis stared at him. “But, out of the two of us, who’s the one still in the competition?”
Adônis grunted out his rage.
“You’re done,” Diego told him. “You tried to take everyone down with you, but you’re just bitter and jealous.” Diego pointed a finger at him. “And you lost the best thing you ever had in your life, because now Caio is mine.”
With those words, Adônis looked at Diego like he wanted to punch him. But Caio stood beside him, and Adônis knew better than to start something he didn’t stand a chance of winning. He was all alone.
“I’d advise you to get a lawyer. Because I’m not letting this go away so easily, Adônis,” Caio told him. “You can go ask for the prez’s help if you want. I don’t care anymore. You can strip away my dignity, my peace and quiet, you can try to take away my chances of winning this competition, but I’m not backing down. Everything you thought about me is wrong.”
Adônis curled his mouth in a smirk, but his eyes held something Caio had seldom seen there—defeat. But he wasn’t admitting it yet.
“At least I’m not the only one that knows you’re good with your mouth,” Adônis quipped, aiming the words at Caio.
“And I regret to this day I wasted it on you.”
Adônis stared at him for a moment and then turned around to walk away.
Caio sighed in relief. But it didn’t feel like he had won.
Chapter Seventeen
THE picture Diego posted from the night before, with Caio and Elton, received a fair amount of attention, especially when the announcement of Elton’s withdrawal appeared online. People flocked to his social media to know more, but he didn’t post any relevant news. It all happened while Diego and Caio trained, so when they left the arena, there were a couple of reporters waiting to ask them some questions.
Marina dealt with them because Caio wasn’t willing to talk to the press and Diego respected his feelings. They made their exit and kept themselves away from the spotlight.
Their opponents were still to be decided, but the departure of a team in these circumstances created an aura of doubt and hesitation behind the scenes. It’s not every day that athletes with a chance to reach the finals give up on the competition.
There were a few comments on Instagram accusing Diego and Caio of forcing Elton to withdraw, but Diego tried not to pay attention to those. There were also others about Caio’s “performance” in that video, and Diego hesitated at the notion that this could hang over their heads for the foreseeable future. The truth might make its
way into the light someday.
“Do you want to watch the game tomorrow?” Diego asked when they were back at the village.
“I don’t know,” Caio said, honestly. He waited a moment, and it seemed as though he didn’t want to elaborate, but with a hesitant sigh, he said, “Maybe you could go alone?”
It was clear that the release of the video haunted him. To Diego, Caio didn’t seem afraid when they were in public, but during training he was always glancing around to see if someone was looking at him.
Diego routinely posted pictures of himself without a shirt, so perhaps he wasn’t as affected by it. But his posts were his own doing, not somebody else invading his privacy. Those were two very different things. He always felt a rush of excitement with the attention he got, but if someone else violated his intimate moments to release a picture of him, he had no idea how it’d feel. And he wondered what was going to happen with Caio now.
“I can stay with you, if you want.” Diego weighed each word on his tongue. They passed other Brazilian athletes coming out of the building and greeted them on the way, but Diego saw how Caio withdrew while they were in the company of other people and only relaxed when they were alone again.
“No need to do that,” Caio assured him, although he didn’t seem certain. “Maybe you can go with Alice and Marina. I’ll stay back to… spend some time with myself.”
“You sure?” Diego asked as they reached the elevators.
“I am,” Caio confirmed. “The less I put my face out there, the better I’m going to feel for now.”
“You’re not mad about the picture from last night, though?”
“No, not really.” Caio shook his head for good measure and glanced at Diego.
That was a relief. It had seemed important for them to celebrate a change of heart, because the teams had been distant from one another until Elton came to talk to them.
Diego would never know for sure what Caio and Elton had to go through while they were involved with Adônis. And for them, it was better to make amends instead of burning bridges, because they both still had a lot to lose.
Upstairs, the door to the apartment was locked, and when Caio opened it, a quick sweep let them know it was just the two of them in there now. For the better part of the Games, there had been a weight following Diego around in that place, that now that they were alone, it was almost as though the apartment seemed to welcome them. Diego could see how Caio settled down when he realized they were safe from the world.
They relieved themselves of their backpacks and then sat down on their beds. Caio seemed drained, and Diego looked at him in a new light. He had always been so strong and in charge of everything, and now he had lost his footing. This time it wasn’t just a simple roadblock.
“How about a massage?” Diego suggested, stretching his arms.
The room smelled like them, Diego realized. It was close to the way one of the guest rooms in Caio’s home smelled like Diego when he went there to spend a few days for intensive training.
“You sure you want to give me a massage?” Caio looked at him with a curious gaze and a slight curl of his lips.
“Why? Are you afraid I’m not going to be good at it?” Diego asked.
“Not really.” Caio sighed, and once again, uncertainty showed on his face. “I guess I’m still thinking about the video and wondering if you want to be with me.” The honesty of those words was almost too heavy.
“Of course I want to be with you.” Diego walked to Caio’s bed and kneeled on the mattress as he put both hands on Caio’s thighs. Caio laid his own over Diego’s, who leaned in so they could hold each other.
“I’m sorry things had to be like this. But for what it’s worth, I don’t think of you any differently than I did before,” Diego told him. And maybe those words were also to prove to himself that nothing had changed between them.
Caio nodded. “So, a massage?” he asked.
“Well, the place is ours now, so you can be as loud as you want, because I heard you a couple of times when we were in a physio session after competing.” Diego shrugged, but his mind was full of memories of Caio grunting in exertion, and he couldn’t help but imagine those sounds in another setting.
Caio huffed out a laugh. He squeezed Diego and then sat back on the bed and supported himself on his arms.
“Do you want to do it now?” Caio asked.
“Yeah, take off your shirt and lie down.” Even though Diego seemed confident, his nerves started to show as he spoke.
“Shouldn’t I shower first?”
“Nah,” Diego shook his head. “I’m going to get you all oiled up. I brought some stuff to use,” Diego didn’t mention exactly why he’d brought it. “We can always change the sheets later… like we should have done days ago.”
At that Caio laughed, but he complied.
He kept his eyes trained on Caio and gave him some space as he took off his shirt and kicked off his shoes. Caio chucked his clothes to the floor, lay down on the bed face-first, and relaxed with a sigh.
Paying attention to Caio’s body had never been a hardship, but now that it was so close to him, Diego couldn’t look away. Caio had generous shoulders and sculpted thighs, but also a protruding backside. It was so close, the muscles pushing against the fabric of his shorts, that Diego couldn’t help but want to touch.
But he still wanted to give Caio some space to relax and enjoy this without any pressure.
Taking a deep breath, Diego made himself turn around and walk to his shelf in search of the lotion he’d brought. He was always forgetting things, but he usually carried his jerk-off stuff, even if he hadn’t had the time for it lately.
As Diego busied himself with his thoughts, Caio was still quiet in bed. With another breath, Diego turned around. His eyes went to Caio’s naked back, and when he approached the bed, he knew there was only one way this could go.
Diego had to swing a leg over Caio on the bed to sit on the back of his thighs. He dropped his weight over Caio in stages and shivered when his half-hard cock nestled oh-so gently against Caio’s ass. He fought to keep a moan inside, though he heard the sigh that escaped from Caio’s mouth.
Diego’s hands shook as he poured lotion on them. He’d been yearning to touch Caio for so long that he welcomed this exhilarating tension, but he didn’t want to seem like an inexperienced kid. His hands hovered over Caio’s back for a minute.
“Everything all right?” The question forced a rush of adrenaline through Diego’s veins, and instead of answering, he put his hands on Caio’s skin, on muscles that moved under his touch.
“Yeah.” Caio sighed.
Diego moved up to Caio’s shoulders and then made his way down in circles as he rubbed the lotion onto Caio’s skin. He tried to think of a situation in the past where he got close to someone without sex on the way, but he couldn’t remember any. This felt different, but it was good.
He needed to keep a tight rein to prevent his hardening cock from intruding in the middle of this, but it was impossible to hide it. So he decided to focus on his hands, to not let them move aimlessly, and with a more assured touch, he searched for any knots of tension in Caio’s muscles and worked them out with his fingers. There was a gravitational energy in effect between them. It pulled Diego close, pulled Caio toward him, and as they stayed together, Diego found a rhythm.
Gradually he started to massage the vertebrae of Caio’s spine, following the lines as he closed his eyes. He could feel Caio in a way he hadn’t been able to before, and something in the motion soothed him, though not enough to distract him from the desire he kept on the back burner.
Then, perhaps involuntarily, Caio pushed his hips up against Diego’s crotch, and Diego moaned, so enthralled in the motion that he couldn’t keep it in. His hard cock finally took over.
“Caio,” Diego uttered the word almost without any air leaving his lips. “I don’t think you—” he had to stop when Caio pushed against him another time, and then again, more forcefully, and
Diego found it hard not to ride out the movement.
He was perfectly nestled on Caio’s cheeks and he wanted more, but he didn’t trust himself to ask.
Caio pushed against him another time, and Diego put both hands on Caio’s shoulders.
“If you keep doing this, I’m going to—” Diego stopped short when Caio repeated the motion as though he wanted to make Diego suffer even more.
“What are you going to do?” Caio asked him.
Diego whined.
“You know what I’m going to do,” he complained. “I’m barely out of my teens, so if you keep at it, this is going to take a minute.”
Under him, Caio laughed and pushed his hips up again. It was too much for Diego, so he put both hands on the bed and lifted his hips off Caio. He looked at the tent in his shorts—he was leaking already, his cock throbbing with desire.
Without Diego’s weight over him, Caio turned around and offered his body as he lay down again. It was easy to see that Diego wasn’t the only one turned on.
He put a hand on Caio’s abs to stop himself from collapsing but it didn’t help much when he felt the muscles bunch up under his touch.
“I know you brought some condoms. Go get them,” Caio urged him.
Diego stared at him with wide eyes, and a zing of energy shot from the bottom of his feet to the crown of his head.
He obeyed and got up from the bed. His legs didn’t want to move properly, but Diego got to his shelf and searched in the pile of bags. In his clumsy state, he made them topple to the side, and Caio chuckled.
“Stop it,” Diego admonished.
“What?” Caio asked.
Diego shook his head. “This is all your fault,” he said as he opened a bag and rummaged for the packet he saw the other day. When he found it, he huffed out a breath and turned to the bed.
Caio patted the space on each side of him, and Diego hesitated for only a moment before he kneeled with one leg on the bed, kicked the other one over Caio, and straddled him. Then he leaned down to Caio.
Matchpoint Page 14