FOURTEEN
Hayes stared at Ren’s outstretched palm, the ache in his chest making him feel like he was going to crack open. “I said I don’t want to use you.”
Ren stepped closer, took the glass out of Hayes’s hands, and drained the contents. Hayes couldn’t help but watch his throat work, couldn’t stop his gaze from sliding down Ren’s bare chest, the tattooed skin, the beautiful lean body he was almost as familiar with as his own.
When Ren plunked the glass back on the counter, there was a calmness there in his eyes. “Use me, huh?”
Hayes swallowed. Nodded.
Ren’s lips lifted at the corner. “I hate to break it to you, but I’m not some dude you picked up at a bar. I’m not one of those guys you experimented with in college. This isn’t a hookup, Fox. We’ve been in a relationship since we were seventeen.” Ren leaned forward. “You wouldn’t be using me. You’d be consummating what’s already there.”
“What’s already there,” Hayes repeated.
Ren cocked his head, a wry look on his face. “You think I would’ve put up with your broody ass for so long if I didn’t already love you?”
Hayes blinked, the words like a cymbal crash in his head.
“I mean, goddamn. I’ve had to deal with you for all these years, pine and write you letters while you were in prison, accept your questionable taste in music, share women with you and not touch you, too. And I’ve gotten absolutely no fringe benefits from all these selfless acts. Not even a hand job every now and then. You suck as a boyfriend. Just so you know.”
Hayes stared at him, the words hitting him like a cattle prod. “You love me?”
Ren crossed his arms over his chest, brashness there but also a hint of vulnerability. “What? You don’t love me back, asshole?”
“Well, yeah, but . . .” The words hung in the silence. They’d slipped out easily, without effort or angst. Hayes had never told anyone except his family that he loved them, but he felt the simple truth of the statement like it was part of his DNA.
“But?” Ren lifted a brow.
He shook his head, the mild buzz from the alcohol doing nothing to soften the impact of this revelation, and scrunched his brows. “But nothing, I guess.”
Ren grinned. “Excellent. So you love me.”
“I . . . Yes.” Yes. “I love you.”
Something flickered in Ren’s eyes, relief maybe, but it was gone as quickly as it appeared. He leaned forward and braced his hand on the counter, a smug look of challenge replacing the tender one. “Good. Now, what are you going to do about it?”
Hayes stared at him, and it was like a curtain parting, a new world revealing itself. They loved each other. Had for a long time. He could have this. Without guilt. He could touch Ren. They both wanted this.
That knowledge felt like chains falling away from his limbs, that dragging pull of weight lifting from his chest.
He rose from the stool, a jolt of something powerful and freeing moving through his veins, and reached out to grab the waistband of Ren’s pajama bottoms. Ren’s fists clenched, like he was fighting hard to keep himself still, fighting not to take over. Hayes dragged him closer, the warmth of his skin radiating against Hayes’s knuckles. “I’m going to take you to bed.”
Desire darkened Ren’s gaze. “You sure you remember how to do this, Master Hayes?”
The sound of the old name rang through Hayes, rousing long-dormant things. It’d been a hell of a long time since anyone had called him that, and Ren’s roughened voice saying it was like a physical stroke to Hayes’s cock. But he wasn’t going to require that formality from Ren. The last thing he wanted to do tonight was trigger bad memories for him. “You don’t have to submit. I just want you.”
Ren swallowed hard and held the eye contact. “Maybe I need it as much as you do. Maybe you’re not the only one who’s been living a little scared.”
Hayes inhaled through his nose, trying to bank the need fighting to overtake him. Four years. It’d been four years since he’d had anyone in his bed, since he’d touched or been touched. Four years since anyone but Lenore had kneeled for him. And over a decade since he’d first wanted Ren that way. His voice was strained when it came out. “What’s your safe word?”
Ren’s gaze flicked away. “I never had one.”
The admission twisted Hayes’s gut. That fucking sociopath hadn’t given Ren any kind of reprieve. A sixteen-year-old kid trapped with someone with no mercy, no heart. “Well, you’ll always have one with me. Pick one.”
“Black.”
“Good.” His hand was still gripping Ren’s waistband and he let his fingers slip below the elastic. It didn’t take long for him to reach what he was looking for. He brushed his knuckles over the damp head of Ren’s cock, earning a hissed breath from Ren and an answering punch of desire in his own gut. Hayes groaned. It took everything he had to reel in the impulse to yank Ren’s pants off right there, turn him around and bend him over the counter. The primal ache to just fuck and fuck until they were both raw and spent was like a beast snarling at the gates. The years of deprivation pressed at his will, those years in a cage urging him to act like a starved animal. But he wouldn’t rush this. He wouldn’t fuck this up. “Take me to bed, Muroya. We’ve both waited long enough and I don’t want to do it on the kitchen floor. At least not this time.”
Ren smiled this smile of dirty intent and grabbed him by the shirt. “Let’s go, Master Hayes.”
They were quiet as they made their way down the hallway, but Hayes was sure his pounding heart could be heard down the block. Ren had asked if he still remembered how to do this. He sure as hell hoped so.
Ren bumped open the door to Hayes’s bedroom with his elbow. Stacks of books lined the side of the bed and a big-screen TV dominated the other wall. Other than that, Hayes hadn’t put out any personal things. All his stuff was still in boxes in storage. It was like he’d re-created an upgraded version of his prison cell. Bland. Empty. Temporary.
Depressing as shit.
“Not my room,” Hayes said.
Ren didn’t question. He just backed up and went farther down the hallway until they reached his room. Unlike Hayes’s bedroom, Ren’s looked lived-in, comfortable. Modern pen-and-ink artwork on dark blue walls, a king-sized bed with mussed white sheets, clothes thrown over a leather bench by the window, and no television to distract. Ren had always believed that bedrooms were for sleeping and fucking, not electronics.
Hayes wasn’t coming here to sleep. Ren stepped inside ahead of him, and Hayes shut the door with a push of his foot. He eyed the armoire on the far side of the room. It’d been a while, but he doubted things had changed. Ren had always kept a good supply of toys tucked away in that cabinet.
But Hayes didn’t need any toys tonight. Ren would be more than enough. Too much probably. It would take everything Hayes had to maintain his control.
“Turn around. Let me look at you.”
Ren faced him, thumbs hooked in the waistband of his pants, a cocky stance. Some things never changed. The guy had always known he looked good. Not that Hayes could argue the point. Finely honed muscles beneath beautifully tattooed skin and deep brown eyes that made filthy promises he knew Ren could keep. Ren had always turned heads and wasn’t ashamed to use that to his advantage. Hayes smirked. “Your dom is showing.”
Ren sniffed, all challenge and smugness. “Guess you’ll have to fix that for me, sir.”
Sir. The formal address made Hayes’s cock flex against the zipper of his jeans. Hayes took slow steps toward him, closing the distance between them and holding his gaze. He stopped in front of him. Ren’s erection was prominent against the soft fabric of his black pajama bottoms. Hayes’s fingers flexed, wanting to feel that heat against his palm, but he resisted. Patience.
“Show me you’re not too drunk to be making this decision.”
Ren smiled, stood steadily on one foot, and started reciting the alphabet backward.
Hayes cut him off before he reached A. “Undress me.”
Ren wet his lips, the subtle shift in his demeanor revealing he wasn’t as calm and collected as he wanted to appear. He stepped closer and went for the buttons on Hayes’s shirt. He focused on the job. One button. Two. Three. But the simple feeling of Ren’s fingers brushing against Hayes’s chest was enough to send goose bumps over his skin and more blood to his cock. The fabric came open and Ren’s eyes raked over him, open hunger there. He pushed the shirt off and onto the floor.
“I like the way you look at me. What are you thinking? No editing,” Hayes said, voice gruff.
“That your body is fucking amazing. That I’m glad I finally get to touch you.” His mouth twitched into a chagrined smile. “That I wouldn’t mind seeing you tied up for me so I could explore.”
The response didn’t surprise him. Ren had been trained to be Gordon’s slave, but he’d been a dominant for far longer. The guy was a natural in that role. And though Hayes had never had an inclination to submit, the image didn’t turn him off like he would’ve expected. Trust was a funny thing. “What would you do to me if you had me bound?”
Ren lifted his gaze, his hands gripping Hayes’s belt. “I’d take my time with you. Edge you. I haven’t forgotten how you are in scenes. You get off on holding back and denying yourself, focusing all your energy on the sub. And right now, knowing how long it’s been, I’d be able to torture you really good. I bet I could get you to come with barely a touch.” The backs of his fingertips teased against Hayes’s hip bones. “I’d strip you naked, tie you up, and then I’d describe all the things I’ve imagined doing to you.”
Hayes’s throat was dry, but he didn’t want Ren to stop talking. “Like what?”
Ren slowly pulled the leather belt through the buckle. “I’d tell you in detail how I would suck your cock. How I’d put my tongue everywhere and fuck you with my fingers while I did it. Then I’d describe how it would feel to be deep inside me. How tight and hot that’d feel around your dick. How hard I like to be fucked.”
Hayes groaned.
Ren dragged the belt out of the loops. “Or I’d tell you about those times when I’d sleep over at your place and stroke myself and fuck my fingers while you slept next to me. How I’d come all over myself and have to clean up without waking you.”
“Fuck.” The words were like gasoline on a bonfire. Ren dropped the belt to the floor and Hayes grabbed Ren’s wrists. He drew them behind Ren’s back, holding them there. “You’re a dirty bastard. You got off while I was sleeping?”
“You’re a deep sleeper.”
“Tell me what you’d think about when you did it.”
Heat flashed in Ren’s eyes as their erections brushed against each other. Hayes’s grip tightened.
Ren didn’t look away—bold as ever. “You. Holding me down, taking whatever you wanted, shoving your cock in my mouth, my ass, using me. Fantasies of you always had a flavor of force.”
Hayes frowned. “I would’ve never forced you.”
“I know. That’s why I could go there in my head. You were the opposite of everything I’d been exposed to before that point. With you, I knew I could get the thrill of that game without the threat. I’d always been attracted to the game. That’s what got me in trouble in the first place.”
The admission was almost too much for Hayes to take in. A force fantasy was what had gotten him thrown in jail. The thought of ever doing that again scared the hell out of him. And in general, his dominance had always been on the more pleasure-focused side rather than the edgier one. But he couldn’t deny that there was a piece of him that craved that darkness sometimes. And the thought of playing that game with Ren was all kinds of tempting.
He released Ren’s wrists. “Finish what you were doing.”
Ren inhaled and nodded, like he was dragging himself back from that fantasy reel as well. He went to work unfastening Hayes’s jeans. “You did this for me that first night. You probably don’t remember.”
“Oh, I remember.” The words rumbled from Hayes as the memory played in his head as fresh as ever. “You were wearing jeans that were two sizes too big for you and black briefs. You got hard. I got awkward.”
Ren smiled but didn’t look up as he unhooked the button on Hayes’s jeans and dragged down the zipper. “I was hoping you’d take it as an invitation.”
“I wasn’t ready for you.” Hayes planted his hands on Ren’s shoulders. “But I’m RSVPing now. Get on your knees, Muroya.”
Ren stilled at that, his gaze jumping upward.
Hayes pushed. “I said knees.”
Ren lowered down, and for the first time, Hayes saw a flicker of that vulnerability, a snap of nerves, reminding Hayes that this was the first time Ren had submitted or bottomed for a guy since Gordon.
Hayes took a steadying breath. “You have a safe word.”
“I’m well aware.”
Hayes took that for what it was. Ren would use a safe word if he needed it. “Touch me. Show me you know how to handle cock.”
Ren’s expression lit with a hint of that trademark wryness and he dipped his hand in the open fly of Hayes’s jeans. Hayes had skipped underwear today, so there was no barrier when Ren wrapped a hot hand around him and stroked.
Hayes groaned and he tipped his head back. “Goddamn.”
The physical sensation of being stroked by someone other than himself was mind-blowing in its own right, but knowing it was Ren stoked the embers to a blaze. It’d been too long. Too fucking long since someone else’s hands had been on him. So many lonely nights in prison. So many long nights since. There was no helping it, no time for analyzing. He had planned to simply put Ren on his knees for a test, to make sure he was okay with this, not to be selfish. But primal instincts took over. The hand and hot breath on his dick were too much.
“I need your mouth, Ren.” His voice sounded choked to his own ears, a throat knotted with warring factions. His fingers dug into the hard muscle of Ren’s shoulder.
“Yes, sir.” The soft hush of fabric sounded as Ren tugged Hayes’s jeans down and off. Not hurried. Not frantic. Methodical. Tortuous. Hayes’s stomach dipped in anticipation. But nothing topped the soft sound of pleasure from Ren when he dragged his fingers through the trail of hair that led down Hayes’s abdomen and then took Hayes’s cock in his hands. That under-the-breath curse. A simple whispered word that meant everything. That was all Hayes needed to hear. There was no masking that reaction, what it meant. Ren wanted this as much as he did.
This was right.
Ren stroked him with long, confident fingers, slow and sensual, spreading the fluid at the tip over the head and teasing the underside with his thumb, mapping him, learning the terrain. Hayes’s fingertips bit into the flesh of Ren’s shoulder, and he tried not to think of why Ren would be so good at this, about how he’d been trained to please. The soft light of the lamp surrounded them, cocooning this forbidden exchange in a cloak of silence, a dream world, and it allowed his dominant side to shimmer fully to the surface. “I didn’t tell you to play. Give me your mouth.”
Ren continued to tease. To stroke and cup him. A challenge. Make me.
Force me.
It sparked something in Hayes, flint against steel. Acting on nothing but pure gut, he reached out and gripped the back of Ren’s head. He hadn’t fooled around with a guy since college. So this was a different sensation, the short, silky strands against his fingers instead of long locks, but not an unwelcome one.
Ren grunted at the grip but didn’t fight him as Hayes guided him forward. The second Ren’s lips closed over the head of Hayes’s cock and slid down its length, fireworks went off behind Hayes’s eyelids. “Oh, fuck.”
It’d been years. Eons. He’d thought a blow job was a thing a man could never forget, but he had. He’d forgotten the intense bliss of that hot, wet suction, that sensation of every molecule in his body being attuned to one very specific place. He tipped his head back and held on to Ren like a life raft, rocking forward and forcing himself to make it last, to go slow, to not ram his friend right through the wall with the force of his need.
Ren groaned around Hayes’s shaft like he was relishing every single suck, like he could do this forever, and then he shifted forward, taking Hayes to the back of his throat and holding him there.
A chain of filthy words slipped out of Hayes in one uninterrupted rush, and Ren only took him deeper. Both Hayes’s hands clamped around Ren’s head. “Christ, Muroya. You trying to kill me?”
Ren eased back a bit, his tongue dragging along the underside of Hayes’s shaft at a painfully slow pace.
The sudden change made Hayes’s eyes flutter open. He had to see, had to look. He glanced down, finding Ren staring up at him, the warm glow from the lamp lighting half his face. Hard angles and hot desire. It was a bizarre sight, his best friend with his mouth wrapped around his cock. But it was the heavy lust in his eyes, a flavor of which Hayes hadn’t seen before in Ren, that tugged something inside him. They’d shared women. He’d seen Ren in many compromising and intimate moments, but this was different. It wasn’t submissive exactly. There was still that I-dare-you gleam in Ren’s gaze, but there was satisfaction, too. He was getting off on knowing he was responsible for Hayes’s pleasure.
He gripped his hair tighter. “I didn’t tell you to stop.”
Ren’s eyes narrowed as he held the gaze and took Hayes deep again, working his throat and blowing Hayes’s mind to bits with every sweep of his tongue. Then he cupped Hayes’s sac in a warm palm and slid a teasing fingertip farther back.
More cursing fell from Hayes’s lips and he gritted his teeth to hold back the orgasm.
Staring at each other was almost too intense. It was like they were at war. Who was going to win? But somehow it made it hotter. More electric. This was a side of Ren he’d never seen. The great dominant on his knees and enjoying it.
He licked his lips. “You like doing this, Muroya? Does sucking my cock make you hard?”
Ren’s gaze lit with wicked satisfaction.
Hayes tipped his head up. “Show me.”
Ren pulled off with a wet popping sound and leaned back. Hayes looked down, finding an impressive outline in Ren’s pants. The sight made his blood run hot. He’d seen his friend with a hard-on and naked more times than he could count. But this was different. This was for him. Ren was getting off on submitting. Hayes’s voice was hoarse when he spoke again. “Take it out and jerk yourself while you suck me. But don’t you dare come.”
Ren’s throat worked, but after a brief second, his hand went to his pants. He dipped his fingers inside the fly and pulled out his long, curved erection. It was a cock the women they’d been with had always said hit them in just the right place. Now Hayes found himself wondering if it did the same in men.
“Give me your hand,” Hayes said, the words coming without thought now. Ren lifted it and Hayes spit in his palm. “That’s all you get. Fuck yourself and don’t come unless I tell you to.”
Ren’s cock flexed against his belly and fluid glistened at the tip—a ringing endorsement that this was working for him, giving Hayes an extra boost of confidence that he hadn’t taken this too far. Yet.
Ren wrapped his hand around himself and stroked. Hayes was fixated by the tight grip, on the way the slick head darkened when Ren moved his hand toward it, but soon the view was blocked when Ren leaned forward and licked Hayes from scrotum to tip, making him moan and forget everything else he’d been thinking.
Hayes couldn’t watch anymore after that. He was too lost. Too far gone. He let his head fall back and went along for the ride.
Ren sucked and licked and massaged, edging Hayes, knowing exactly how to bring him to the brink and then back off. And all the while the wet sound of Ren’s hand on his own dick played background music. The guy was taking his fucking time. Walking that fine line between pleasurable and unbearable for them both. And Hayes should’ve wrested back the control. The sub didn’t get to tease him, but it felt too fucking good and he wanted to savor this.
But soon, both of them were too close to wait any longer. The sound of Ren’s fist became faster, more frantic, and the motions of his mouth matched pace. Hayes couldn’t stop the grunts he was making, and before long, he was shoving his cock down Ren’s throat, out of control and desperate.
He didn’t want to come this way. He didn’t want this to end this quickly. Sensation rocketed through him like a locomotive. “Can’t. Gonna.”
He gave Ren the chance to pull off, assumed he would, but Ren only doubled his efforts, taking him deep and pressing a fingertip against Hayes’s hole. Stars burst behind Hayes’s eyelids, leaving streaks of light, and the force of his release barreled through him. A shout scraped over his throat as he came, long and loud, and shot everything he had down Ren’s throat.
Ren groaned along with him and hummed through his own orgasm, finally pulling off and coming all over his hand and the pristine wood floors.
Messy. Out of bounds. And so fucking hot, Hayes’s cock jerked in aftershock.
Hayes’s head bowed and his heart thumped like it was going to pop out of his chest. Sweat rolled down his back. But despite the orgasm, his body didn’t settle. He still felt this pounding need. Too many years of denial were built up. His cock was still half-hard.
He reached out and grabbed Ren’s bicep, helping him to his feet. “You came without permission.”
Ren smiled, lips slick from sucking Hayes’s cock. “Guess you should do something about that.”
Hayes couldn’t help it. He laughed. Goddamn, how had he not realized he loved the arrogant son of a bitch? He grabbed Ren by the neck, tugged him forward, and kissed him.
Ren stiffened for a moment, like he hadn’t seen that coming, but then he gripped Hayes’s waist and pressed his mouth and body to his, giving in to the kiss. Skin to skin. Lips and tongues colliding.
Hayes sank into the connection, the taste of his come mixing with the lingering flavor of whiskey and Ren. His hand tightened on Ren’s neck as he deepened the kiss and soon his cock was hard and bumping up against Ren’s. Yes. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one up for a round two. They ground their hips against each other and hands explored until they were both fully hard again.
Hayes had forgotten how erotic it was to simply kiss and be touched, to have no barriers, to play. He’d rarely done that with subs. The scenes had always been more structured. He walked Ren backward until he hit the bed. They tumbled onto the mattress together, making out like teenagers and grunting and groaning like they were going to explode. Ren was as aggressive as he was, taking and touching and shifting their positions. But when Hayes pinned him down and locked his arms against the bed, he didn’t miss the catch of breath in Ren’s throat.
Hayes broke away from the kiss. “Supplies?”
Ren’s pupils were so big his eyes had gone black, blitzed on lust. “Drawer on the right.”
Hayes reached over and rummaged around, grabbing what he needed. He tossed the lube and condom on the bed and braced himself over Ren. “Want to know a secret?”
Ren’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “What’s that?”
Hayes leaned down next to Ren’s ear. “I knew what you did in my bed. I used to pretend to sleep so I could listen to how hot you sounded when you came. I’d jerk off every morning remembering it.”
Ren hissed out a breath.
“Now let’s see if all that fantasizing was worth it.”
He climbed off Ren and flipped him onto his stomach. Part of him wanted to fuck him face-to-face but that’s not what Ren had fantasized about. He’d wanted dominant, aggressive Hayes. He’d wanted to be used. And Hayes would happily give him that.
Hayes yanked Ren’s pants the rest of the way off and then shoved Ren’s thighs forward, spreading him. The sight was one that had Hayes’s cock painfully hard again. The strong, sleek body of his best friend glazed in sweat and open for him. Hayes loved women and their bodies, that softness and all those curves. He loved to worship at that altar. But there was also something unbearably arousing about a powerful man like Ren surrendering to him, especially knowing Ren didn’t afford anyone else this privilege.
Mine.
He poured lube into his palm and took Ren’s cock in his hand, stroking it and making it glossy and slick, taking his time and getting Ren rock hard again. He ran his thumb over the slit and teased.
Ren’s fingers curled into the sheets. “Fuck, yes.”
“You think you can handle me, Muroya? I know it’s been a long time.” Hayes slicked lube over Ren’s opening, massaging and teasing and enjoying the sounds the moves earned from Ren. He pushed the tip of his thumb inside.
“Christ. If you don’t fuck me right now, I really may tie you down and beat you,” Ren said, his hands now tight fists. “You’re not going to hurt me. I still use toys sometimes. Please. Fuck.”
“Maybe I’ll just tease you all night. Play. I mean, I’ve already come. I’ve got time.”
“Oh, fuck you. You’ve made me wait for a goddamned decade. You aren’t that much of a sadist.” Ren rocked back, taking more of Hayes’s thumb.
The sight of part of him disappearing into Ren’s body and the feel of Ren’s muscles tugging was all it took. His cock flexed against his belly and need roared through him. He pulled back and grabbed the condom, fumbling for a bit. Out of practice.
But once he had it rolled on, everything else came as natural as breathing. He grabbed Ren’s hips, positioned him just how he wanted him, and slid home.