by Lily Morton
Max has been a good guide, which isn’t surprising, because if you turned him upside down and shook him, stories would come tumbling out. He knows Venice like the back of his well-travelled and badly behaved hand, so I’m sure I’ve seen a side of the city that tourists rarely do.
Every few minutes, he’d drag me down some picturesque alley or back street, finding unique experiences beyond the well-trod tourist spots, with the air of a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. He’d waited patiently as I goggled at each place—like the opulent Doge’s Palace or the beautiful Saint Mark’s Basilica—regaling me with facts and insisting on taking hundreds of pictures.
He treated me to peach Bellinis in the famous Harry’s Bar, a dark little place that had apparently been frequented by everyone from Ernest Hemingway to Charlie Chaplin. The Bellinis were lovely, with the sweetness of fresh peaches cutting through the tart prosecco, and we drank them as he regaled me with some extremely scurrilous tales of an Italian politician he’d seen in here with his two mistresses. Then he whisked me to a little restaurant in a quiet square where only locals went, and we ate bigoli in salsa—a thick spaghetti in an anchovy sauce.
As the day draws to a close, a melancholy descends. Our time together has a limit. Tomorrow is the conference, and then we’ll be back in England, and then when the two months are up, I’ll have to go back to the agency. He’ll return to his conquests, and I’ll have to pack away the maelstrom of feelings he’s raised in me again and get on with my life.
Being with him here has been a pleasure-pain all its own. In this city, I’ve been given a view of what it would have been like if we’d worked as a couple, and it’s wonderful and everything I secretly wanted. I’ve imagined how it would be to spend my days hearing his warm, rough voice and listening to his laughter that seems to fill a whole room.
The problem that tortures me is that our circumstances haven’t changed. Not really. Max turns me into a fool who dreams of being with him like this for eternity—traveling and laughing or just sitting in his cosy fairy-tale cottage. But this isn’t a fairy tale—Max hasn’t suddenly gained the ability to fall head over heels in love with me. The shadow of Ivo still looms between us, and Ivo-shaped shadows do not belong in the happy-ever-afters I’ve dreamed about.
I frown as I think back on the times he’s mentioned Ivo on this trip. And my thoughts surprise me. Because Max has actually brought him up in passing a few times. I realise suddenly that this is something that has changed about Max. Back when we’d been together, he never spoke of Ivo. No matter how hard I steered a conversation in Ivo’s direction, Max would veer away from the subject like a startled horse.
“Felix?”
I look up to find Max watching me.
“You alright?” he asks. “You were far away.”
“Oh, yes.” I clear my throat of hoarseness. “Just wondering whether you intend to walk to the mainland tonight.”
“So snippy,” he says affectionately. “Come on. We can shortcut down here.”
“You don’t sound very sure,” I call as I follow him down a narrow alleyway.
He looks back and grins. “That’s because I’m not. Last time I took this route, I was pissed out of my tree.”
“When weren’t you pissed out of your tree?” I mutter, avoiding the hanging tendrils of a plant. “You’d have given Lindsay Lohan a run for her money.”
He laughs. “I’m always amazed I didn’t take a header into the water.”
“That’s because you’re like a cat. Only with ninety lives.”
And I thank God for every one of them, I think with a passionate fervour that brings a flush to my cheeks.
He shrugs. “Considering some of the scrapes I’ve been in, someone must have been looking after me.”
“Whoever it was is probably in rehab now, Max. You should send a fruit basket.”
I’m grateful for his laughter because it covers up the turmoil of my feelings. It’s so easy to imagine Max taking a faulty step or three and tumbling into the water or in front of a car. He’d been reckless for years. I might never have met this big, warm man, never heard his laugh, never had all his attention beam on me like a lighthouse, illuminating parts of me that nobody else ever bothered to see.
We come out onto a path, the canal stretching ahead of us. The water slops gently, and the houses crowd over us, big and narrow with their tall windows. Voices and music come from one house, bright windows sending lozenges of colour over us and illuminating Max’s expression as he gazes into my eyes. I look up at his handsome face, watch the breeze tousling his wavy hair, and suddenly it’s all too much.
“Max,” I whisper.
I slam into him, pushing him against the dark building beside us and pressing my lips against his. For a second, we both still in surprise, and then he groans loudly and opens his mouth to my tongue. Everything instantly dies away—all my thoughts and worries—replaced by a surge of the delicious heat we’ve always generated together. A sudden feeling of sweet relief makes tears prick my eyes. Nobody has ever felt so right against me, as though I’m made for just him.
I sag against him and he gives another deep groan and grabs me closer, kissing me furiously, his good hand roving all over me as if he’s familiarising himself with some terrain he used to know well.
I don’t know how long we kiss for, but when he pulls back, our panting breaths are loud and humid between us, puffing white in the cold air. I shiver, feeling the loss of his heat immediately, and he hugs me to him.
“Felix?” he says hoarsely. There’s a question in his voice and all the answers I can’t ask for yet.
I nod, pressing my head against his shoulder. “Yes,” I say, my voice suddenly clear as I push everything away that’s been clouding my head for two and a half long years. “Yes, Max. Please.”
“You don’t ever have to say please.” He clasps my face and smacks a kiss onto my mouth. I think he meant the kiss as a brief punctuation of his words. But “brief” has never happened with us. He kisses me again. And again. Coming back for more until we’re panting and I push him away.
“Not here,” I whisper.
“Come on.”
I take his hand and let him draw me after him. The journey back to the hotel seems almost like a dream. One minute, we’re walking closely together with his arm around me and his scent in my nostrils. The next, he’s opening the door to our room, pushing me through and slamming me against the wall, then kissing me as I start to strip off our clothes.
We fall onto the bed, still kissing. I’m down to my T-shirt and briefs and one sock, and he’s just in his boxers. He rolls on top of me, and I wind my legs around his waist, thrusting up at him so our cocks grind together behind their layers of cotton. I send my hands greedily all over him, trying to relearn a country that I once knew so well, aware that he’s doing the same to me, his cast rough on my skin. And still, he kisses me, eating at my mouth with a fervour that he never showed before.
His body feels exactly the same, and I moan my pleasure into his mouth, the sound becoming a sharp intake of breath as he pulls back and pulls my cock from my briefs. He holds it in his long fingers and then bends to lick a stripe up it and rub it gently over his face. The stubble is a bright prickle of pleasure-pain.
“Oh shit,” I mutter.
He roots his nose at the base, inhaling deeply. “I’ve missed this smell,” he says, looking up at me with heavy-lidded eyes.
“Hardly the pulling technique of the century to call your partner smelly,” I say snootily.
He smiles and I can’t look away, because it’s so completely and utterly tender and looks so right on his handsome face.
“I missed you too,” he says, and the simple honesty in his voice floors me. “Every single day.”
I open my mouth to try and steer us back into the snarky sex we used to have, but lose my train of thought completely as he takes me back into his mouth and starts to suck. My eyes roll to the back of my skull, and I groan loudly.
When I come back to myself, we’re both naked, and he’s lying between my spread legs, his head bobbing as he sucks me with his finger rubbing at a spot inside me that makes my mouth tingle.
I feel the tell-tale tightening in my balls and grab a fistful of his hair. “Max,” I say hoarsely. “Please now.”
He lets my cock go and stares up at me. His lips are full and red and shiny, and his breaths are coming quickly.
“Yes,” he says and leaves the bed briefly to paw through his bag.
He comes back with a condom and the lube, and I roll onto my stomach.
“No,” he says quickly.
I gaze at him over my shoulder. “No, what?”
“I want to see you properly while we fuck. I want to lie on you and be deep inside.”
“Why?”
The flush on his cheeks is adorable. “No reason.”
“Well, it’s rather missionary, isn’t it?” I say disapprovingly. “Can’t I just send you a picture?”
He throws his head back and gives a bellow of laughter that fills the room and probably rolls out over half of the Grand Canal. He takes a deep breath and smiles at me. It’s so tender and warm that it makes my belly hurt.
“Indulge an old man, Felix.”
“You’re not on your deathbed yet,” I say dubiously. Then I sigh and flop onto my back. “Oh, go on, then.”
“So obliging,” he says, still giving me that tender smile as he starts to roll a condom on one-handed. He pauses and huffs as he fumbles it, and I knock his hand away, finishing the job with expert fingers. He inhales sharply at the feel of my hand on him.
I spread my legs, and then hesitate. “How do you want me?”
“Any way I can possibly have you, Felix,” he says gently. “But we’ll start with this way.”
He wets his fingers with lube and traces them over my hole. I groan and open my legs wider. “Get on with it,” I mutter, and he smiles as he gently slides one finger in. And that’s the way he preps me. Gently, thoroughly, and with a rough tenderness that is totally alien to the way he behaved back in the day.
Finally, he tilts my arse up and notches his cock. I choke out a groan as he starts to push in. He feels so big.
He pauses immediately. “Alright, darling?”
“Don’t call me that,” I scold and then lose the power of speech as he enters me in one long, continuous movement, stopping only when he’s fully rooted.
“Oh God, that’s so good. Keep going,” I say, my voice hoarse and broken.
“If the room fell in, I wouldn’t stop,” he promises me. “Alright?” he asks.
I nod, clasping him to me tightly and winding my legs around his narrow waist.
He starts to move with long, smooth thrusts that hit my sweet spot and send sparks flashing behind my eyes. His body is long and hot against mine, his chest hair abrading my nipples deliciously and his hard stomach rubbing against my cock.
“Oh God, this is a genius position,” I gasp.
He chuckles. Then he kisses me and the pleasure ramps up even more. Back in the day, we didn’t really kiss much during sex. I was usually on my knees or up against a wall or face down on the carpet. It was fantastic sex. The best I thought I’d ever had, but we were obviously missing something because this is epic.
And tender, I realise with a sudden shock. Every move he’s making is tender, with some unspoken feeling behind it. It’s in the way he touches my body as he fucks me, trailing long fingers over my chest and rubbing my nipples, moving the same hand down to cup my bum and draw me closer so that I’m surrounded by his body and his scent. His kisses are sweet and hot, and all the time he’s kissing me, he’s still fucking me with that wonderful cock.
I close my eyes, unable to keep them open under this onslaught of passion. It’s never been like this before.
Max’s thrusts speed up, and he groans. “Shit, I’m close.”
“Come in me,” I whisper, drawing his mouth back to mine greedily. I want more of these kisses. He gives two or three thrusts and then stills and groans long and low. It raises the hairs on the back of my neck as I feel the warmth from him filling the condom. He rides out his climax with short stabs of his hips, groaning into my mouth, and I pant out a protest when he pulls out.
“No, don’t, Max. I need to come so badly. Please.”
“Like this, love,” he says. He bends and takes my dick into his mouth, sucking hard while pushing two fingers gently into my hole, and it’s the spur I need. I arch my back and shout as I start to come. He takes the first spurt into his mouth, swallowing it down, but then pulls off and jerks me, bending so the last spurt lands on one of his cheekbones, before sucking me back into his mouth and suckling gently to ease me down.
He slides up the bed in one fierce movement, rolling me into his arms and sharing a kiss that tastes of my come. We kiss hungrily for a long while, until he pulls back and tugs me into a hug that’s almost painfully tight. For once, my smart mouth can’t do its job, and I just lie there, inhaling the scent of sandalwood and feeling like I’ve finally come home.
My eyes flutter closed, and I’m dimly aware of Max muttering something into the skin of my neck, the words low and tender, before he draws the covers over us and pulls me back into his arms. Sleep pulls me under.
I come awake slowly the next morning, sunlight dancing across my closed eyelids and an intense warmth blanketing my back. I luxuriate in it. I’m always so cold. Memories of last night slowly flood my mind, and I realise why I’m so wonderfully relaxed and delightfully sore.
The body behind me stirs and stretches, and then Max says, “hmm” in a very satisfied way, and the arm around my waist tightens, and his hand starts to slide down my belly towards where my cock is waiting, stiff and ready like it always is with him.
“Oh my God,” I say loudly. I scuttle up the mattress to sit with the covers dragged around me, leaving Max beautifully nude on the gold-coloured sheet.
For a long second, we stare at each other. “Well,” he finally says. “If I was hogging the covers, Felix, you should have just said so. No need to take my nose out in the process.”
I notice the red mark on his long nose where my elbow made contact in my haste to put some space between us. “Sorry,” I mutter. “Didn’t mean to do that.”
“Really?” he asks with lively interest. He rolls to his side and rests his head on his good hand. His cast is a brilliant white in the winter sunshine. “That’s a relief. It’s never a good sign if your bed partner decides to maim you.”
“With your personality, it surely can’t be a new experience,” I mutter. I try to avoid looking at all the goodies on display, but it’s been a long time and all his best bits are right in front of me, so I find myself staring. He stretches in a luxurious fashion, and my eyes narrow. “Stop… Stop preening,” I snap.
He grins. “I’m just so… mmm. Stiff.”
I make a strangled sound because his cock is hard and pointing towards his belly button, all those delicious inches of blushing goodness. “That’s your age,” I snap. “Muscles get strained.”
“Especially when they’ve had such an active night,” he says, winking at me. “Still, I must make the best of every single day.”
I shake my head. “We need to talk about this,” I say, which is ironic because I haven’t the slightest fucking clue what I actually want to say. Nor the slightest clue what I actually feel, to be honest. Part of me is aghast that I gave in after all this time. That I abandoned all my principles for a night in the sack with my ex. The rest of me is cheering and demanding an encore.
And meanwhile, the whole of me is buzzing with life. Like I’ve been asleep for a century and just awakened. No fairy tales, I remind myself harshly.
“This can’t happen again,” I start to say. “I—”
“No time for that,” he interrupts, giving me a very innocent smile as he rolls out of bed. “We’ve got to get ready for the conference. Order some breakfast for us, and I’ll take
the first shower.”
So, he doesn’t want to shower with me? I shake away the thought impatiently. “But we should talk.”
“I’m sure we will,” he says airily. “I know how you do love to talk, darling.”
I tear my eyes away from his naked buttocks because I’m pretty sure he’s flexing them deliberately. “We will talk,” I shout after him. “And don’t call me darling.”
His warm chuckle makes my eyes narrow. “I’m going to order the most expensive breakfast on the menu,” I say loudly. “And I’m definitely taking the dressing gown.”
And of course, we don’t talk. Max keeps breakfast light, making me laugh against my will and stealing kisses flavoured with the homemade apricot jam. Then it’s a whirl of activity as we dress.
I put on my suit from the Orient Express—an experience that already seems like years ago—and Max wears a Tom Ford three-piece grey suit, opting to carry the jacket as he can’t get it on over his cast. He was born to wear something like that. Or nothing at all.
“You alright?” Max asks, interrupting my ogling of him as I fasten his red tie for him.
“Yes, why?”
He grins. “Just that there’s this little bit of drool here.” He reaches out and pretends to wipe my mouth before sauntering away. I follow him out of the door, staring at his back in a very threatening manner that, unfortunately, he can’t see.
Chapter Eighteen
Felix
The conference is being held in a very upmarket hotel. I fully expect Max to abandon me early on because he’s immediately surrounded by smiling people who call out to him happily. Instead, he stays near me, promising to meet people afterwards. He gets me a drink and finds me a seat, leaving me only when I force him to, and his name has been called by the organiser four times in an increasingly agitated voice. I smile at her consolingly as they walk away. Max could have wound up Saint Francis of Assisi.