Every Breath You Take

by Robert Winter

  Zach wrapped both arms tightly around him and held him until his body stopped trembling and finally stilled. With a groan Thomas shifted positions to allow Zach to lower his legs. Then he held the end of the condom as he slowly withdrew from Zach’s body.

  Holy shit.

  As he rolled onto his back, he pulled off the condom. He tied the end, threw it in the nearby wastebasket, and sagged back down onto the bed, still breathless. Something about the way Zach gave and took pleasure was utterly unique, and Thomas had to squash the thought, More….

  Zach reached for him and then stopped with a chuckle. “Umm. I’m all sticky here. Do you have a towel?” Thomas gave him a quick kiss and got up to fetch a wet washcloth and a dry hand towel.

  He knelt down by the side of the bed and ran the warm cloth over Zach’s body to carefully wipe off the river of come from his chest, his stomach, and then finally the head of his long cock. He followed up with the dry towel and took care of the lithe body in his bed as he made sure Zach was dry and comfortable.

  Thomas’s stunned response to the way they fit together alarmed him, and he knew he had to pull his patented dick move. Yet he found himself delaying as he made sure Zach felt good.

  He quickly swiped at his own chest and belly, swabbed at the headboard with a low laugh, tossed the washcloth and hand towel into the bathroom, and then climbed back into bed. Zach pressed his long, lean body against him and rested his head on Thomas’s shoulder. He whispered, “That was amazing. Thank you.”

  His body fit perfectly, and Thomas held tight for one moment longer. He kissed Zach’s brow and told himself it was best to rip off the Band-Aid quickly. In a louder voice than he intended, Thomas turned his head and said, “You’re a tiger—I didn’t see that coming. I’m glad we had this chance, Zach. You’re going to have a lot of fun out there.”

  He felt Zach freeze against his body as he clearly caught the unspoken message, “Out there with other guys. Not here with me.” After a long moment, Zach rolled his face away from Thomas and asked in a quiet tone, “Do you want me to leave?”

  His disappointment made Thomas ache. “You’re more than welcome to stay the night this one time,” he answered and only then realized he had broken another one of his entrenched rules. For the first time in Thomas didn’t know how long, he wanted to see more of this surprising young man.

  Would it be so bad?

  He choked down the thought as well as the regret he felt at pushing Zach away. What if he were wrong again? What if Zach were just putting on an act of normalcy and naïveté? Thomas couldn’t take the risk because, even dead, Charles Rumson was still fucking up his life.

  “You’re a beautiful man, Zach,” he said into the silence that lingered between them.

  “So you said.” Zach climbed out of bed to look for his underwear. If Thomas had hoped to ease the awkwardness, he failed. Silence stretched. Zach’s long legs and lean flanks glowed in the dim room, and Thomas wanted to reach for him, even though he knew he would merely prolong things.

  Zach suddenly whirled to face him, briefs in one hand and shirt clenched in the other. “Did I do something wrong, Thomas?”

  Thomas’s resolve disappeared at the sadness he heard in that question. He stood up from the bed and reached out to touch Zach’s waist. “No, nothing wrong at all,” he said in his most reassuring voice. “This is just how it is with me. I don’t date. I don’t do repeats. With anyone.”

  “God, I’m such an idiot,” Zach sighed. “I have so much to learn.” The disappointment was rapidly turning to hurt. That was par for the course. Normally Thomas would just let it alone, but he didn’t want Zach to beat himself up over Thomas’s issues.

  “I’m sorry, Zach. I should have made it clear before we left the bar that sex is a one-time thing for me. I’d like to be your friend, but I can’t do anything more.”

  Zach looked at him, and a little frown line appeared between his eyes. “Can’t? What does that mean?”

  Well, shit. The man is quick. I should have left it alone after all.

  “Nothing. I’m just an asshole. Okay? Ask Randy. He’ll tell you this is absolutely about me and not you. And I know that sounds like a cliché, but it’s true. Please don’t take it as an insult or a slight. You’re a hot man, Zach, and you’re going to meet a lot of other hot men. It’s what I said earlier—you should be a kid in a candy store and lick every lollipop you can find.”

  That earned him a little smile. “I was always more partial to pop rocks,” Zach said, and the slightest smirk stretched his beautiful mouth.

  Thomas relaxed a bit and stroked up and down Zach’s side. “How do you feel about Sweet Tarts?”

  “Well, you were kind of tasty,” Zach teased. “Or are we still talking about candy?”

  Relief washed over him. Good. Zach got it. Maybe Thomas would actually manage to keep a friend out of his own fucked-up situation. He hoped so, anyway because Zach had depths worth exploring. As a friend.

  But maybe a little more time together first wouldn’t hurt? This one night?

  Thomas grinned as he said, “I deserved that. Look, Zach, I’m being honest here. You can leave, which I completely understand, and I hope the next time we run into each other at Mata Hari, you’ll have a drink with me and give friendship a shot. You could also ignore me, which I would regret, and chalk this up to a life lesson.” He still had his hand on Zach, and he carefully began to stroke toward Zach’s chest. He didn’t quite graze his nipple, though he could tell it was getting stiff again. “But it’s only two in the morning, and I’m betting you don’t have to be up early on a Sunday. There was big talk earlier about taking the second round a little more slowly….”

  Zach sank down onto the edge of the bed and bit his lower lip. Thomas sat beside him and looked at him with his best puppy-dog eyes as he let his hand drift down Zach’s firm belly. His fingertips grazed the wispy hair at the base of Zach’s hardening dick.

  “You really are an asshole, aren’t you?” Zach observed, but a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Well, if all I get is one night with the most handsome man in the world before I do a walk of shame in the morning, I’d better make it count.”

  He fell forward and pushed Thomas onto his back. He brought his hands up around Thomas’s head and tightened his fingers in his wavy hair.

  ZACHARY WOKE up in thick, white blankets and looked around the stark room, confused… until Thomas walked in with two mugs of coffee.

  “I don’t know how you take it, so one is black and one is cream and sugar,” Thomas said as he held out both cups.

  Zachary ran a hand through his hair and said, “Black is great, thanks.” He took the proffered mug and inhaled the strong aroma that wafted out. “That smells great. Thank you.”

  “My pleasure.” Thomas took a sip from his mug, his eyes on Zachary’s neck. The silence stretched between them awkwardly. Finally Thomas said, “Help yourself to the shower, if you want. We worked up quite a sweat.”

  Zachary nodded. “I will. Thanks.” He drank deeply from his mug, set it on the nightstand, and climbed out of bed. He hesitated and then said, “I’d better get cleaned up and out of your way.”

  Fifteen minutes later Zachary buttoned up his overcoat, pushed open the glass door from the lobby, and emerged onto the street. He looked left and right as he tried to get his bearings, and then he started toward the Capitol. He felt the need to take a long walk while he figured out how he had misjudged the evening so badly.

  Of course he had known Thomas was too sexy to find him worth pursuing. But he had felt a connection beyond the physical. Thomas did too. He was almost sure of it.

  He tried to let the disappointment go. Maybe Thomas knew what he was talking about. Maybe Zachary needed to grow up, move on, and enjoy the bounty of good-looking men in the city. Be a kid in the candy store indeed.

  But it would be hard to forget Thomas’s hands on his body or that look of wonder he gave Zachary when he came.

  Zachary h
eaded into the chill morning breeze, his head down in thought. He was completely unaware of the man in the silver-framed glasses who trailed after him.

  Chapter 4

  ZACHARY RELUCTANTLY pressed speed dial for his parents’ phone in Ogden. His mother picked up, and apparently Caller ID gave him away, because she said, “Oh good. I was going to call you tonight if we didn’t hear from you.”

  He squelched his guilt and just said, “Sorry, Mom. I’ve been pretty busy settling in to the job and the apartment.”

  “They aren’t working you hard already, are they?” she asked, and Zachary could hear the helicopter-parent edge to her tone.

  “I’ve been to a lot of training classes on how the systems work and how they do things at Treasury. It’s fine.” He sounded petulant to himself and vowed to work on that. “I really like my boss and the people I work with.”

  “Well, that’s something, at least. I still don’t understand why you took that job instead of waiting for the supervisor position to open up here.”

  “I told you, Mom. This is a great opportunity for me. With Treasury Department experience on my résumé, I can eventually move up into higher levels of management.”

  “But you’re so far away in that awful place. It’s only a matter of time until the terrorists strike.”

  Zachary rolled his eyes. “Mom, that could be true anywhere. I’m not going to hide away because of the possibility of an attack.”

  “Did you find a church to join yet?”

  He winced. “Not yet.”

  “Well, you get on that. The Lord will protect you, but you have to meet Him halfway.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Desperate to change the subject, he asked about his father and his younger brother. He managed to end the call before his mother could ask if he had met any nice girls yet.

  He wished he had the guts to come out to his parents, but every time he reached for the words, he pictured scared teenagers holding out bowls in the soup kitchen. What if he told them and then the job at Treasury didn’t work out? He might need to go back to Ogden. He couldn’t afford to burn that bridge to his childhood. It was just common sense to keep his secret, and his parents really didn’t need to know yet anyway.

  I’m a fucking coward.

  Full of self-recrimination, he listlessly wandered around his one-bedroom rental and trailed his fingers over the surfaces. The small apartment he had found in Alexandria, Virginia was a short commute from Washington, and he liked it well enough. Everything he had brought was unpacked. His Sandman leather-bound omnibus collection had pride of place among his graphic novels and other books, and his DVDs were organized by series and then by year. The Doctor Who boxed sets took up an entire shelf, and every one of the Star Trek and Star Wars movies, series, and cartoons were lined up below that.

  He had reluctantly left his comic book collection in Utah for the moment, but his books and movies were precious souvenirs from a childhood lived as an outsider. They were proof to him that, despite his parents’ criticisms every time he came home with a new treasure they thought was beneath his intelligence, he made it through and got out of Utah in one piece.

  That night, though, even with the place as homelike as he could make it, Zachary was unable to settle down. He found he had no patience to sit and watch one of his movies or television shows, and he couldn’t concentrate on a book.

  What he really needed was to make some friends. Thomas immediately sprang to mind, but he recognized that impulse for a bad idea as he recalled the way he was shown the door Sunday morning. Whatever moment Zachary thought he had shared with Thomas, whatever pleasure they found in each other’s company and bodies, he must have overstated to himself. Even if Thomas were sincere about trying to become friends, Zachary knew the sight of Thomas turning his blue eyes to a new partner would flay him to the bone.

  On the other hand, Mata Hari was a nice, friendly bar. Joe and Terry were a lot of fun. Maybe they’d be around that night. Or he could call the number on Joe’s card. In any case Mata Hari seemed like a good place to start meeting new people, even though it was a twenty-minute cab ride away. He told himself firmly he was not going there to see Thomas. Really.

  That turned out to be good, because Thomas wasn’t around when he entered the bar. In fact only about fifteen people were scattered about the main room. Terry was indeed there, talking to a youngish man Zachary hadn’t met, but there was no sign of Joe. Zachary took a seat at the bar, and Randy looked up at him as he wiped a glass dry.

  “Seven and seven?” he asked.

  “Yes, thanks, Randy. Good memory,” Zachary said, and Randy grunted. “Quiet night?”

  Randy turned to fix his drink but said over his shoulder. “Yeah. Thursdays haven’t taken off yet. Thomas won’t be in, case you’re wondering.” He set the glass in front of Zachary, who blushed.

  “I wasn’t wondering.”

  “Good.”

  Randy turned away to rinse some more glasses, and Zachary blurted out, “You guys are friends, right? I mean, he’s not just a customer?”

  Randy shot him a look that would have made him run a year before. Zachary held his ground, though, and gazed unflinchingly back at Randy. That was part of the reason for the move—to find his balls and finally grow up, far away from the controlling parents who made him feel he had to deny everything true about himself. Next to his parents’ constant pressure and disapproval, Randy’s glare was nothing. He pushed down the nerves and refused to blink or turn away. After a moment he could have sworn he saw amusement grow in Randy’s eyes.

  “We’re friends,” the bartender finally said, grudgingly. “Thomas and I used to work together, sort of, before I retired.”

  “You look way too young to be retired. What did you do before?” Zachary asked.

  “I used to be Secret Service,” Randy answered as he pulled some bottles out of a box behind the bar.

  “No kidding? Was that exciting?” Zachary dared to press since Randy wasn’t growling yet.

  “Not so you’d notice, most days. But that’s kind of the point. When things got exciting, it was usually because they’d turned to shit.”

  “Oh. Well, that makes sense. I know law enforcement personnel can retire younger than the rest of us, but still, you give up a lot of benefits,” Zachary observed, fishing. Randy gave him a raised eyebrow, but he pushed ahead. “Did you have such a burning desire to open a bar that you couldn’t wait?”

  “That’s it, kid. I traded black suits and exotic travel to stock a bar and answer nosy questions.” That would have stung, except that Zachary could see an amused glint in Randy’s eye.

  “Was Thomas in the Secret Service too?”

  Randy shot him another look, and that one was stern enough to make Zachary’s testicles run up into his abdomen to hide. “You’d better ask Thomas if there’s anything you want to know about him. But I wouldn’t bother, kid. He won’t answer.” Randy turned back to his bottles and continued to check items off an inventory.

  Zachary quietly sipped his drink for a minute and looked around the room. He noticed Terry had his hand on the other man’s knee, and things between them looked surprisingly intimate. None of his business, he supposed, but Joe was so nice. Zachary hated to think Terry was maybe cheating on him.

  Randy apparently noticed where Zachary’s attention was focused and said, “Terry and Joe have an open relationship. Don’t judge.”

  Zachary snapped his eyes back to Randy. “I’m not judging. Honestly. I was worried for Joe’s sake, but it sounds like they’re fine.”

  “They are.” Randy set down his inventory, picked up a bottle of tequila and two small glasses, and poured them each a shot. “This is for caring about Joe.” Zachary grinned and clinked his shot glass against Randy’s. They both tossed them back and slammed the glasses on the counter.

  Emboldened, Zachary said, “Thomas said I should ask you to confirm he’s an asshole.”

  Randy quirked an eyebrow at him. “Context?”

&
nbsp; “He told me he never takes anyone home twice, that it’s his issue and nothing to do with me, and that you’d confirm it.”

  Randy stared at Zachary for a moment. “That’s surprising. But yes, all that is true. I’ve had to sweep up three broken glasses that people threw at Thomas’s head when they didn’t believe he was strictly about the fuck and chuck.”

  Zachary winced. “Ouch. I’ve never even heard that expression before, and I hate myself a bit.”

  “Like Thomas said, it’s his issue, not yours. No repeats, no exceptions. And no more questions.”

  Randy turned away, clearly done with the conversation, so Zachary took the not-too-subtle hint and carried his seven and seven to the piano. The woman playing it glanced up as she moved her hands over the keys.

  “The boys here call me Miss Ethel. Anything you’d like to hear, hon?” she asked.

  “I love what you’re playing now.”

  She smiled and kept working through her repertoire. When Zachary recognized a Nina Simone song, he began to sing the lyrics quietly.

  Miss Ethel nodded encouragingly at him. “That’s a nice tenor, hon. Sing out.”

  The tequila had kicked in, so Zachary began to sing the lyrics with a bit more confidence. Two of the other patrons came over to join him through the verses, and when the song ended, one of the men squealed in delight.

  “Oooh, that was lovely. You should come sing with the Chorus.”

  Zachary asked, “Chorus?”

  “The Washington Gay Men’s Chorus. Auditions are soon, and you’re front-row material,” said one of the men. “I’m Howard, and this is Steve.” They chatted, and Miss Ethel obliged Steve’s request to play another torch song to which they all knew the lyrics.