by Joey W. Hill
“Come here.” He put Ange in front of the bowl of batter, Robert behind him, hands resting on Ange’s hips.
“Do you want me to stir?”
“No. Keep still.” Robert applied pressure to bend Ange over the bowl. “Draw in a deep breath. It smells like all the good parts of wanting, doesn’t it?”
“Yes,” Ange said, his breath shortening as Robert stepped closer, pressed against his backside.
“Hands on the counter on either side of you. Lift that gorgeous ass that belongs to me.”
Lust flashed in Ange’s eyes as he complied. Lean muscle rippled along his long arms as Robert ran callused hands up under the tank to caress and stroke his abs, the light down of hair that led beneath the drawstring. Then up, to his chest, over the nipples. Ange’s torso stretched in appreciation, his backside lifting even further.
“That’s it. When I touch you, I like the way your body speaks to me. Asking me to be fucked. But never telling me. You’re a good boy, respectful of your Master.”
“Yes, sir.” A quiver went through his ass, now under Robert’s hand. He pushed the pajama bottoms down to Ange’s ankles so he could see the bare beauty of it.
Where to start? He had a million perfect choices. He went for a handful of the confectioner’s sugar he’d be dusting on the top of the cake when he was done. He pushed the flannel shirt and tank up to Ange’s shoulder blades and smoothed the sugar onto the flesh below, letting the rest sprinkle over his ass and to the floor. Then Robert followed the sugar with his mouth, tasting the hint of sweetness on Ange’s back, taking his time, sucking and licking down the valley of his spine, over his ribs, to the small of his back and the rise of his ass.
As he pushed his hands between Ange’s thighs to cup and squeeze his balls, Robert nipped at those delectable cheeks, the upper thighs.
Ange’s head dropped back, that guttural moan coming from him. From his body language, Robert knew he was absorbing how he was being touched the same way Robert was experiencing it. Full sensory input.
Robert rose to his feet, a possessive hand on Ange’s hip again. He reached over him, to the pottery container for cooking implements. The metal spatula with a dozen nice holes cut into it was in easy reach. He saw Ange watch his hand close over it, felt the erratic breath bellow his chest, then escape those distracting parted lips. The quick look Ange shot him told him he wanted what Robert intended, even as his eyes held that titillating apprehension that a Master liked to see.
“Lift up on your toes. Spread your legs as much as the pajama bottoms will let you.”
It tightened all those muscles in a beautiful display of male power, all at Robert’s command. When he landed the first swat, Ange jumped, let out a muffled yelp.
Yeah, he’d made it a little hard, because he’d wanted just that reaction.
“What do you say?” Robert growled in his ear.
“More, Master. Please.” The desperation in Ange’s voice spread inside Robert’s chest like Christmas cheer.
He gave him several more swats to increase the feeling, and to reinforce the lesson of who was who in their relationship. They could be playful, Ange could redecorate, but when his Master gave him an order, he’d follow it. And be rewarded with punishment.
He inhaled the vanilla and sugar flavored ingredients, so evocative, the smell became the anticipated taste on the tongue. It wasn’t the only thing in the room that had that capability. He thought of how often he’d absorbed Ange through one sense, like sight, and it had translated to the others, even before he was close enough to touch him.
Robert had intended to keep this to foreplay, but the Crisco was too damn convenient, the top already popped off. He scooped some up on his fingers and rubbed it on Ange’s rim. As his knuckles pressed into that warm crease, he registered the jump in Ange’s shoulder and arm muscles.
He had his head bent over the bowl, so he was getting an even more heady dose of that tempting scent. He also looked as if he was riding the same overwhelming wave of sensations Robert was feeling, only his were coming from the teasing touch of Robert’s tongue on the back of his neck and shoulder blades, the firm pressure of his lips, his hands on his long, graceful body. The probing touch of his greased-up fingers, promising that his ass was going to be plundered by Robert’s thick cock in a matter of seconds.
Robert fitted the head of his cock to the slickened opening, and sunk in. Growled at the pleasure of it. Pulled back, did a slow return. He cupped his hand over the boy’s throat, drew his chin to the side to let him feel the pressure. His fingers rested on Ange’s pulse as he brushed his lips over the sandpaper jaw. His boy—his man—hadn’t shaved yet this morning.
“You have the sweetest, tightest ass,” he said, and Ange expelled a shaky breath.
“Thank you, Master. It’s yours.”
“I know.” Robert reached between Ange’s body and the counter and gripped his dick. “What about this?”
“Yours, too.”
“You going to touch it without my permission? Ever? Even when I’m not around?”
“No, sir. Thank you, sir.”
That add-on, the fervency of it, told Robert his response wasn’t just in the moment. Ange wanted that control. He gobbled up any rules Robert offered like a gift. The stricter, the better.
Robert was certain Ange had been a professional dancer, or had been striving to achieve that goal. That took discipline, total commitment, no shortcuts. Was it chicken or egg? Had the boundaries of submission made the structure of dance even more appealing, or vice versa?
Maybe it didn’t matter. Perhaps it was like the relationship of arteries and veins, giving and taking to keep the heart pumping.
“Put some batter on your finger and let me taste it.”
Ange complied, bringing his hand back to Robert’s mouth. Robert tasted, sucked deep on the finger as he stroked. Gripped, and felt Ange’s cock convulse in his grasp. Ange let out another little moan, a grunt of need.
“You’re thinking of my mouth on your cock,” Robert said. “I’m thinking about it, too. But right now, I just want to fuck you into total oblivion. Push the bowl away, put your cheek down on the counter. Cross your hands over the middle of your back.”
When Ange obeyed, Robert adjusting with him for the change in stance, Robert put one hand over his crossed wrists, a firm hold that told Ange where his hands should stay. Robert used that hold to increase the power of his thrusts, driving into the welcoming channel that gripped him so blissfully tight. It shoved Ange’s thighs against the wooden cabinet below the sink, making the doors rattle.
“God…” Ange muttered it in a near whisper, biting his bottom lip, eyes half closed. His fingers curved tight over Robert’s knuckles, seeking contact. His thighs quivered, his ass lifting so they were perfectly fitted each time they came together.
“You hold out,” Robert warned.
“Always, Master. Never…without your permission.”
He might never let an hour pass without Ange bent over or on his knees to take his cock. Or dancing for him, sleeping beside him. Robert’s balls drew up. It was those provocative images as much as the physical sensations that had him spilling himself.
“Come, Ange,” he snarled.
Ange’s hips jerked, cock pulling in Robert’s grip as his warm release flooded over Robert’s fingers. Ange pressed his cheek hard to the counter as he ground back into Robert, taking him deep, using his body to beg Robert to stay that way within him.
Maybe neither of them would ever stop wanting, feeding each other with that spiraling desire, a meal that always satisfied but never relieved the hunger.
Robert moved with him, making sure Ange got the full measure of his squeezing grip. He made it a bit rougher at the end so Ange’s mouth flattened and breath whistled, body bucking. Not to fight Robert’s demands, but to dance with it, like the push-pull of a tango.
Did the kid ballroom dance? If he didn’t, Robert was sure he’d pick it up quick. He’d never been so glad h
is mother had made him take those lessons with her as a teen. There was a gay club in Charlotte that had a ballroom night. They could dress up, tango, lambada, waltz…he loved thinking of doing that with Ange. Maybe Ange could dance in front of others if they were dancing as a couple.
They’d both finished, and he was having those thoughts while leaning against his boy’s curved back, Ange’s skin slightly damp from their exertions. As Robert nuzzled between his shoulder blades, he released Ange’s cock to rub his come into his hard abs and higher up. He did a teasing, slick circle around the nipple that had Ange’s ass flexing against him.
“Didn’t put a condom on you,” Robert murmured. “You made a mess. Take off all your clothes and use those to clean it up. The clothes need a wash and I want you naked.”
He slowly withdrew from Ange, trailing his hands down his sides, the caress a balance to the stern words. He brought Ange up but then gripped his shoulder, pushing him down to his knees. Ange’s gaze lingered on his cock as Robert tucked it back into his pajama bottoms.
Retrieving a washcloth from under the sink, Robert wet it down and tossed it next to Ange’s crumpled pajama bottoms and shirt. “Get to it,” he said. “We have cake to finish and showers to take.”
Ange’s eyes contained that spark of challenge that wasn’t really a challenge, more a spirited response. He’d do as he was told, but he was aware of the teasing nature of it, Robert making him come, then accusing Ange of making a mess.
After pouring the cake batter into the pans and putting them in the pre-heated oven, Robert poured himself a fresh cup of coffee and leaned against the counter.
“Good thing we pushed the bowl out of reach,” he observed, watching the flex of Ange’s ass and thighs, the vulnerable soles of his feet, as his sub cleaned the floor and cabinets. “Else the recipients might have gotten a little something extra in that cake.”
From what he knew of the group home’s unusual members, they might very well appreciate that.
Ange managed a laugh at the joke, but Robert’s keen ears picked up an odd note to it. Ange had kept his head down these past few minutes. As he straightened to sit back on his heels, clean-up done, his back was to Robert. A tremor went through the arm holding the washcloth.
“Hey.” Robert immediately set aside his coffee and dropped to a squat in front of Ange. Taking the cloth and clothes from Ange’s tense hands, he tossed them toward the laundry room and touched Ange’s jaw. “Look at me,” he said. “That’s not a request.”
Ange flicked a desperate look at him. He wasn’t crying, but his eyes were glassy, and he swallowed as if the lump in his throat could choke him. Robert sat down against the cabinets and brought Ange down between his bent knees, leaning him back against him. Robert made sure the skirt of his robe was spread on the floor beneath him, between his spread thighs. It cushioned Ange’s ass from the cold tile. Cupping his hand over Ange’s forehead, he pushed it so his head rested on Robert’s shoulder.
Ange tentatively gripped Robert’s other hand, lying against his chest. When Robert didn’t object, he brought it up so he could kiss Robert’s rough knuckles.
“That’s my boy,” Robert said. “All good. Talk to me. Tell me what’s going on.”
A breath lifted Ange’s shoulders, and he relaxed further. “I haven’t felt this safe in a long time,” he said. “It’s…I didn’t expect the way that would make me feel.”
Robert’s brow creased. “Explain that.”
Ange’s temple rested against Robert’s jaw as he spoke. “I don’t mean like safe from being mugged. More like a safety net, under my heart and soul. Keeping them from hurting so much. Feeling so lost.”
The hollowness to Ange’s voice suggested he was in that lost place. Robert closed both arms around him, crossing them over Ange’s chest. When his hands curved over his sub’s biceps, he had him fully banded against Robert’s solid body.
“That has to do with the shit that you won’t talk to me about,” he said, not unkindly. When Ange tensed, he sharpened his tone, a reminder and reproof. “I’m not going to make you talk about it. I never have, have I? I haven’t pushed it, but we’re getting close to the time that needs to change, Ange. You’re smart enough to know why. When you get lost like that—so bad you end up homeless and bleeding in an alley—withdrawing and closing yourself down isn’t going to help anyone find you. Is it?”
Ange remained silent. Adjusting his head, Robert saw his brow was creased, the lowered green eyes troubled. He could feel all of it struggling inside of Ange.
Two years of grief had made Robert act in inexplicably self-destructive ways. Since whatever gripped Ange was at least as bad as that, Robert got how hard it was to do what seemed healthy and logical to someone not in that dark place. And hammering him with it might just increase the depth of that blackness.
So he quelled the automatic reaction to say more. Instead, he just held him, giving him that safety net, the reassurance that he was here. Only moments before, Robert had taken him thoroughly, at every level. He was going to teach Ange that was something he could count on, not just during sex.
The current surroundings had to help. The two of them were cocooned by the smell of cake batter, the angles and gleam of stainless-steel appliances, the ticking of the wall clock. The blast of warm air from the vent above them. They were home. Together.
Robert was just about to bring them back toward the idea of showers and more casual conversation when Ange surprised him by giving him more.
“Sometimes it’s like one of those stories where you’re in an alternate reality, one step off from everyone else. You’ve gotten knocked there, and you don’t know how to get knocked back.”
Robert brushed a kiss over his cheekbone. “Maybe it’s like a rebirth. You have to come through a womb, so to speak, to get back into the world with everyone else. And birth is a pretty rough process.”
“Yeah.” Ange shivered.
“Hey. It’s okay. Stay with me.”
“I’m here.” He gripped Robert’s forearm with both hands, hard. Maybe he meant it as a reinforcement of the words, but there was desperation in the clasp. The shiver rocked Ange again, his muscles getting as rigid as if he was being hit, not held.
Robert uttered a quiet noise of reassurance. As he did, he adjusted his hold, his palm brushing one of the gunshot scars on Ange’s abdomen. It hadn’t been intentional, but Ange jerked, a noise of pain coming from him. Robert didn’t react to that, instead keeping the hand moving. His palm slid over his pectoral, along the bump of the nipple, and up to caress the base of his throat. He made Ange tip his head back to Robert’s shoulder again, so he had to uncoil the tense curve of his back, lean into him.
“Easy,” he said. “Stay with me right here. Still safe. We have errands to do today. Cake to deliver. No time for that nonsense. Right?”
Ange dropped his head against Robert’s, a supplication. When Robert stroked his hair, tugged it, Ange sighed.
“Sorry,” he said. “Don’t know why I… Everything was feeling so good.”
Robert knew why. Grief, loss and trauma had a lot of overlap in the ways humans dealt with them. Strong emotions could stay buried as long as you were vigilant. But when all the walls came down—like during a powerful coupling that was as much emotional as physical—they could break loose. Robert needed to help Ange understand that letting that happen wouldn’t be the end of the world. Not even close. It could be the beginning of better things.
He’d been around Ange long enough to know how to help him handle this kind of episode. Only today, Robert had the right, and the opening, to respond to it a different way.
“Turn your head toward my shoulder.”
When Ange complied, Robert put his mouth on his exposed throat and began to tease the flesh he’d marked with tongue and teeth, over and above the collar. He imposed demand and offered tenderness, a devastating combination to a man who craved a collar the way Ange did.
Ange’s neck fascinated Robert mor
e than any other man’s had. With Ange’s entire body trained for dance, the turn of his head, the way he dropped it back when in the throes of passion or pleasure, the dip of his chin as he was focused on something, highlighted the strength and grace of it, the flexibility.
When Robert tugged on the collar with his teeth, Ange’s groan said he loved Robert’s reminder of ownership. “You’re here with me,” Robert said against his flesh. “No matter what thoughts or memories come for you, you’re never any farther from me than this collar is from your flesh. That’s part of the message it sends. I’m the shelter in the storm.”
“You’re also the storm itself. It carries me away.” Ange dug his fingers deeper into Robert’s forearm. “Like a tornado. I’ve dreamt about dancing in one. Spinning and flying. When you’re inside me, thrusting, demanding, pulling everything from me, it’s like that. I feel like that. I don’t want it to end. Even as you make me need to come so bad I can’t think straight.”
Robert liked hearing that, a lot, so he kept working on his throat, dropping his hand down between Ange’s spread legs to grip his cock, already trying to rise again. “I want to keep you wanting like that. I like knowing my sub is ready for me whenever I want his ass. His throat. His mouth. Every part of him.”
Hell. He wasn’t ready to go again, in theory, though it felt like every other part of him was.
“But…” He transitioned the neck devouring back to dragging, easy kisses, nuzzles of the pounding pulse, “This is not getting my to-do list done. Go take a shower while I finish up with the cake. Put your clothes in the wash on quick cycle and I’ll throw them in the dryer. You can grab a warmer shirt from my closet.” He briefly touched Ange’s throat. “This is leather, so you’re allowed to take it off for the shower and put it back on right afterward.”
“I wish I didn’t have to take it off at all.”
With an act of will, Robert got them back up on their feet and gave Ange a push. His sub wasn’t helping, gazing at him as if he wanted Robert’s mouth back on him. Robert retrieved the spatula, waved it at him. “Go. Or else.”