Fair’s fair anyway. I left him the night we fucked at his place. “Okay.”
“Okay,” he echoes. “Send me your address. I’ll be there in a couple of hours.”
It’s not the kind of thing anyone can promise with L.A. traffic, but he makes it pretty fucking close, and while I’m sure desperation isn’t a good look on me, my brain is too busy for me to slow down and do something about it. The best I can manage is to keep myself from opening my door when I hear him pull into my driveway, waiting for him to knock instead.
“Jesus,” I breathe.
It’s not the best greeting, but I can’t help it when I see Jake standing there, all sweat and hair and leather andman. I pull him inside and shove him up against the door, his size advantage be damned, and if he minds my tongue in his mouth, he doesn’t say. I’m grinding against him shamelessly, and he lets me take whatever I want, this kind man who doesn’t understand that I’m untethered in a way so unfamiliar to me. I’m a cocky son of a bitch, and people rarely get the upper hand when I don’t care enough for it to matter. The past two days, though? I’m not doing well, and I make it Jake’s problem.
He's my friend, and he’ll help make it okay.
“Happy to help however I can,” he tells me, and I wonder whatI’d said out loud. “But do you mind if I take a quick shower first?”
“Do you mind if I join you?”
His mouth is open against mine, and I think that means he's fine with it. My hands curl around his leather jacket and I drag him away from the door and through my small house until we reach the bathroom. We run into the sink and the wall, and then I’m fumbling to get the water turned on amid all the groping. Jake reminds me we need to get undressed too, and that chaos lasts longer than I’d like, but then we’re naked and under the spray and I cling to him as pathetically there as I have everywhere else.
The shower is decently spacious—Beau had insisted, once upon a time—so when Jake finally backs away from the kiss, there’s plenty of room for him to look at me.
“What happened?”
It’s the same thing he’d asked on the phone, and I hadn’t answered then. I’m not quite ready to answer now, and do what I can to deflect with a joke.
“What?” I scoff. “I can’t be horny?”
“I’ve watched you be horny for years. We both know this isn’t that.”
I nod, closing the distance between us again as I reach for his cock and stroke it. He’s been at least half hard since I got him in here, but it’s a thrill to feel Jake swell in my grip. Our next kiss is slower than it should be, but he’s already seen through me, and I let it happen.
When I try to talk again, I barely mumble. “Can we talk about it after?”
Jake takes my face in his hands and holds me still, studying me with caution that doesn’t surprise me when I let him go. He’s gorgeous just like this—warm and tired and serious—and staring back is far from a hardship. I’m waiting for an answer, but it never comes, and there’s some relief when he helps himself to my soap and washcloth. He’s been on the road and he wants to get clean, and there’s no reason for me to be in his way more than I already am, so I take a half step back.
He catches me there. “Turn around.”
I do it without thinking, and then I feel the washcloth pressed to my shoulder before Jake uses it to scrub me everywhere, slick and strong. Nobody’s touched me like this in years, and while I don’t remember the last time I cried, it suddenly feels like a near thing. Jake kisses the back of my neck while he continues to move his hands over me, and I don’t understand why he isn’t washing his own body.
I’m grateful though, because I want to do it for him.
It’s a few minutes before I’m given my turn, but I make the most of it. I start with his hair—mine hadn’t been a priority when I’d showered just hours ago—and massage his scalp to relieve any ache a motorcycle helmet might have left behind. He moans, and I’m greedy when I arch forward to chase contact that’s not mine to enjoy yet. But then I refocus and rinse his hair and clean his body and carefully drop to my knees behind him, the spray at my back.
“Darren,” he says, his voice so low the water almostdrowns it out.
Jake doesn’t go on from there, and maybe he isn’t sure whether he was trying to turn my name into a warning or a plea. As always, I don’t slow down long enough to demand an answer, my hands curved over his ass until I can open him up to me. He falls forward to brace himself against the tiled wall, and I think I’m almost smiling when I first touch my tongue to his hole. After that, I’m too busy learning new things about him to worry about the expression on my face. I’m slow and fast and gentle and firm, and without a word, I encourage him to want more—to take what I’m trying to give.
He does, stunning sounds muffled and a series of muted prayers offered up while my tongue works him over. In between a dozen other practiced moves, I back up to brush a wet fingertip over him, and watch closely as his body reacts and he hisses above me. For at least a couple of reasons, I have no plans to push Jake any more than this, but it might be fun to talk about it later. Tonight, my selfishness demands something else, and after another minute spent on knees that will hate me tomorrow, I push myself up and embrace Jake from behind.
I grind against him and wrap my hand around his dick. “I don’t want to be in the shower anymore.”
Jake turns when I release him, unashamed about how deeply he kisses me beneath the water. He’s coordinated enough to turn off the spray too, but the kiss doesn’t end for another several seconds, and even then he mostly mumbles against my lips.
“No?”
I don’t answer, guiding him out of the shower instead andhanding him a towel from the rack. It’s warm enough in the bathroom that I’m not all that concerned with drying off, more focused on wiping down the mirror that’s been lost to the steam and tossing my towel to the floor. Jake’s eyeing me, probably closer to suspicious than curious, and maybe it reaffirms something for me, my next step toward him aggressive and needy.
There’s still a towel in his hands, so I take it from him and drop it on top of mine, and then my hands are on his hips, rougher than I’ve been with him yet.
“You’ve gotta fuck me.”