Rockstar Rivals: First Time Gay Romance (4 page)

Chapter Six

Mark

When Mark woke up, he was confused.  There was someone pressed close against him, but he wasn't in a bed, where he would expect to be.  He opened his eyes, gazing down at the messy dark head that was resting on his shoulder.

Gavin.  What was it about this man?  He didn't even like Gavin, but he kept ending up cuddled up with him while they slept.  It was making things very confusing.

Mark glanced around.  Everyone was sleeping, except for, of course, the driver.  He shifted a little, his muscles cramped from sitting in one position for too long.  At the same time, though, he found himself reluctant to move Gavin, and he tried to be careful as he adjusted himself.

It was in vain, though.  Gavin shifted, then gave a moan that was really unfairly adorable, raising his head and blinking at Mark with those huge, dark eyes.  Mark hated this man, but even he couldn't resist his innocence.

“Hey,” Mark offered.  Somewhat pathetic, but mostly without the edge that he usually had when speaking to Gavin.  The worst part of this was that it was becoming hard to remember why he even hated this man.

Gavin glanced at him, then looked down, dropping his eyes in a way that had Mark's cock twitching instantly, it was so submissive, so very beautiful. 

“I did it again, I'm sorry,” he said, then stood up and shifted past Mark.

The older man watched as Gavin grabbed another bottle of water.  Doubtless he needed it

“Yeah, well.”  Mark shrugged.  He should mind more than he did, but he wasn't sure how to say that to Gavin, or if he should.

Gavin headed back for his seat, and then the bus driver abruptly changed lanes and the bus swerved dramatically enough that Gavin staggered.  Without thinking, Mark put out his arms and Gavin fell neatly into his lap.

“Mmm, hey,” Mark murmured, his arms going around the smaller man, tugging him down onto him.  He'd already been half hard, but having that firm, solid weight in his lap, that round, tight ass pressing down against him, he started to swell and harden even more.

Mark gripped Gavin's hips tightly, and groaned when he felt that gorgeous, perfect little ass start to grind down against him.  Gavin was scared of him, and he should be, but he also wanted him and that appealed to Mark's vanity.

“... Hey,” Gavin replied, and his voice had changed, deepened, slightly rougher but no less beautiful.

Oh, this was too damn good.  Mark forced a deep, cleansing breath.  That ass felt far too amazing, rubbing down against his thick cock, and he couldn't think straight.  This was getting too intense between them.

“Hmm, my brother warned you against me, but you're curious, too,” he said, his tone faintly mocking.  “Maybe I should tell him that you hurt me when you leaned down and bit me.  You started that.”

It was certainly effective.  Gavin gave one of those unfortunately adorable little gasps, then struggled to get out of Mark's lap.  The only thing was, once it came down to it, Mark didn't want to let him leave, and he pulled down on his hips.

“No, please, don't,” Gavin said, clearly panicking, and Mark frowned thoughtfully.  Interesting.  It seemed like Gavin really, really didn't want anyone knowing he was anything other that straight.  He could probably use that, if he really wanted to humiliate the boy.

“Shh. I'm not going to tell him anything,” he reassured him.  It was fun having him squirm in his lap, but he didn't want him getting away.  He pressed his cock up against the young man's hot, tight body, then shifted so that he could place a gentle, but somewhat sinister, kiss against Gavin's unprotected throat.

“People are watching,” Gavin protested, and Mark chuckled softly as he looked around.  Everyone was still fast asleep.

“No, they aren't,” he assured him, then bit lightly on his throat, right where he'd bitten him before and left the mark that Gavin still carried.  Casually, he dropped his hand into Gavin's lap, seeing just how desperately hard the younger man was.  Gavin liked this, that much was very clear.

“Why are you doing this?”  Gavin's voice was plaintive, but aroused, all at the same time.  The poor boy was confused, and he turned to look at Mark as if for guidance.  He wasn't used to that, but he didn't hate it.

“I honestly don't really know.”  It was nothing but the truth, and he surprised himself a little by saying it.  “I don't seem to be able to keep my hands off of you.”  He squeezed Gavin's cock, and it was still just as hard as ever.

Just then, the bus pulled up in front of their hotel.  Mark had never considered whether a bus could be murdered before, but right then, with Gavin in his lap and apparently content to stay there, it seemed like a viable option.

Around the bus, people started to stir, reacting instinctively to the lack of motion and waking up.  Just like that, Gavin was out of his lap, heading for the door.  Likely he remembered just how stupid an idea it was to be sitting in the lap of someone who hated them.

Better to get away from Mark, who was probably only trying to humiliate him again.  The only problem was, this time, Mark hadn't planned any of this.  He had done it because he wanted to, nothing more, nothing less.  He couldn't even pretend otherwise.

He watched as Gavin left, walking off the bus at top speed, and tried to tell himself it was better that he was gone.

* * *

Mark made sure to get to the arena first, before anyone else.  He was dressed even more provocatively than he usually would be, and he knew he looked hot.  It was ridiculous, but he wanted to be there before Gavin came.  He wanted the younger man to want him.

Gavin wasn't one of the first people to arrive, though, and Mark kept himself busy.  He warmed up with the members of his band as they showed up, but the whole time, he was watching for the gorgeous young man.

When he finally walked in, Mark lost track of what he'd been doing.  He just stared.  What was it about this damned little brat that Mark couldn't stop thinking about him?  Wanting him?  Maybe if he just had him once, he could get over this.

Gavin took off his coat, and in that moment, Mark remembered why he hated him.

The brat was wearing nothing but another pair of those sexy leather pants and some black boots.  No shirt.  No damn shirt.  His gorgeous body was half stripped, and Mark saw red.

Just when he thought Gavin maybe wasn't so bad, he did something like this and proved him completely wrong.

Storming over, he caught Gavin by the arm and pulled him into a semi quite corner.  He saw Liam giving him a warning look, and growled.  His brother assumed that Mark was some sort of serial rapist or something, just because he tended to like a little bit (or a lot) of roughness in bed.

He warned his brother away with a look, then turned to Gavin, looking him over as the young man stared at him, clearly wondering what was going on.

“Is that what you're wearing on stage tonight?” he demanded, and he could tell that he scared Gavin a little.  Good.

The young man nodded.

“Yeah.  Steve suggested it.”  Steve was their stage manager.  Mark would have to remember to thank him for that.  “I figured I might as well.  It gets so damn hot up there.”

Mark groaned.  Great.  Absolutely perfect.  This little brat just had to keep upstaging him.  He even found himself wondering if that innocent act was just that, an act.  No one could be that naïve, right?

“Great.  I'm going to have to strip on stage or something to compare to that,” he grumbled. 

Gavin looked at him, and those dark eyes of his seemed to sparkle as he looked Mark over from head to toe.

“ …Yeah?” He asked, clearly intrigued, and Mark, against his will, felt his mood start to lift.  Gavin was flirting with him, that was very clear, and he liked it.

“Yeah, if you're going to go on looking like some sex god or something,” Mark grumbled, but there wasn't any heat in it.

Someone came up behind him, but Mark didn't really care.  He ignored them, though Gavin looked over Mark's shoulder, which annoyed him a little.  Gavin should be paying attention to
him
, not whoever was butting in on their conversation.

“I, uh … Have fun with that?” Gavin blurted out, and just like that, any good mood that had developed was gone.  He was right back to being furious at the young man.

“You brat,” he seethed.  Have fun?  Being upstaged by his opening act?  Yeah, who wouldn't have fun with that? 

He reached around and smacked Gavin's ass suddenly.  It was the sort of thing that could probably be brushed off by anyone watching as just playful affection, but Mark put some real sting into it.

“Break a leg out there, kid.  I'll see you later.”

It was a promise, a deadly sincere one.  He was still angry with the younger man, but he also wanted him more than he'd ever wanted anyone else, he was starting to think.

With that, he turned around, almost walking right into Liam.  His lovely big brother, who seemed to have made it some sort of mission to protect poor, innocent little Gavin.  Honestly, Gavin probably did need protecting from Mark.

As Gavin performed, Mark watched.  He was torturing himself, and he should be working on his own warm up.  Instead, he watched as a shirtless Gavin and his band whipped the crowd into a feverish frenzy, cheering and screaming and clapping, singing along to all of his songs.

While he watched, Mark's mood got darker.

When Gavin came back, he was covered in sweat and glowing.  He poured everything into these performances, that would be visible to anyone who was in the room when Gavin played.

“Why am I even here?” Mark asked, not realizing that anyone was listening or would answer. 

“Because you're Mark Tisdale, and the fans came to see you and Crossroads,” Gavin said simply, looking at Mark with an expression that the older man found hard to read.

Mark snorted, not that easily placated.

“I could disappear and no one would give a shit,” he growled, and then he went out to play his set.

* * *

The crowd didn't seem to be cheering as loud for Crossroads as they had for Star Crossed.  Usually, playing could take Mark's mind off of anything, but not right now.  The reception he got seemed lukewarm at best, though strangely, none of the other members of his band seemed to feel anything like that.

When the show was over, when the encores had been sung, Mark stormed backstage.  It was time to find Gavin, to find out just what he'd meant by the things he said, who he thought he was fooling.

Just like that, his mood went from dark to completely black, ugly and jealous and with a possessiveness that really made no sense.

Gavin was gone.  He'd already left.  He hadn't stayed to watch Crossroads perform, damn him.  Content with upstaging him, the little brat had gone.

That wasn't going to stand.  It just wasn't.  Gavin was playing with fire, and it was about time he got burned.

Chapter Seven

Gavin

The whole thing had been too depressing for Gavin to handle.  Mark just didn't have the same energy that he usually did, and none of it made any sense.  He seemed to be jealous of Gavin, but Gavin was only where he was today because he admired Mark so much.

So when his set was over, after only a few minutes, Gavin had sighed and turned away. 

“I'm not up for another party tonight, guys,” he told the rest of his band, and they winced and nodded.  It was comforting, actually, that they were just as unused to this as he was.  At least he wasn't alone.

The previous night had been the epitome of what rock star life was, but tonight he was going to take for himself.   He had some things to sort out in his mind, not to mention some serious, unbroken sleep that he needed to get.

So Gavin stripped down into his boxer briefs, messed around on his phone a little bit, and then went to bed.  It was sort of funny.  At the same time that he was pulling the blankets up to his chin, he realized that Mark was coming off stage, and probably was headed off to another party even as Gavin started to fall asleep.

He was almost there, at that fuzzy point where daydreams because true dreams, when out of nowhere there was a hammering on the door.  Just like that, sleep fled, and Gavin sat up in bed, groaning and rubbing at his eyes at the rude awakening.

“Come out here, you cowardly motherfucker,” Gavin recognized Mark's voice, even though it was distorted with anger.  “Get your ass out here!”

What the hell?  Was Mark completely insane?  Forgetting his state of undress, he stumbled out of bed and yanked the door open, gazing at the older man in confusion.

It looked like Mark hadn't even changed after the concert, and he was covered in sweat.  Things all made a little bit more sense when he saw that the older man was clutching a bottle of Crown Royal, which was open, the whiskey filling the air with its strong, heady scent.

“You're drunk,” he stated flatly, sure of himself.  “What're you doing here, Mark?  I'm trying to sleep.”

Mark shook his head.

“You think you're too good for me now?  You think that you can just leave and not watch me play because you're so much better than I am?  It's not bad enough that you have to show me up, make everyone love you.”

Gavin stared at him, sleep fleeing as he stared at Mark.

“What the hell?” he asked, but his tone was more plaintive than angry.  Maybe he should be furious with this man for practically breaking down his door and then yelling at him, accusing him of strange, baseless things, but he wasn't.  “You have to go sleep this off, man.  You're hammered.”

Mark pushed his way into the room, and Gavin sighed, but shut the door after him.  It seemed like there was going to be some sort of showdown, and honestly, he was glad for it.  It was about time.  Long overdue, really, even if Gavin had just been planning to go to bed early tonight.

This was way more important, in ways that Gavin wasn't even sure how to explain.

“I'm not drunk.  Not really.”  Mark put his bottle down on the side table, and then turned to look at Gavin with eyes that burned.  “I'm pissed off, you little bastard.  Why don't you just take over the whole show?  Play with both bands?  I bet you'd like that.”

Gavin stared at him, and some pieces of the puzzle really started to fall into place.  He'd had some ideas before, of course, but now he was more sure.

“Because the fans didn't pay to see me, Mark,” he said quietly, looking at him steadily.  “They paid to see you, and Crossroads.  Not me.  It's all you.”

Gavin was relieved to see some of the anger go out of Mark.  The older man sighed and flopped down on the bed, rubbing at his eyes.  It must be exhausting to be so angry all the time, Gavin realized.

“No,” the older man said, and now he sounded more sad than angry.  “No, I don't see that.  I read a review of the show online, and they said they'd rather see you than me any day.”

Gavin growled softly.  This was because of a review?  One stupid review?  Even he knew that some reviewers were just assholes and would say anything just to get a rise out of people.

“Then the person who posted that was an idiot,” he said firmly.  “I know what the fans think, and who the hell else matters?”

Mark raised his head, and he was suddenly glaring at Gavin once more.  Damn it, what had he said now?  Dealing with Mark was like walking through a field littered with landmines.

“And then you didn't even stay to watch me play,” Mark growled, and Gavin sighed.  Since when had his opinion on anything mattered to Mark?  Except that it seemed that it did.

“It hurt to watch,” he said simply.  He hadn't wanted to go into this.  He really barely knew Mark, and making these sorts of personal comments were a good way to piss someone off.  But then, Mark was already so pissed off at him.  “Because I could tell you were mad.  You're always mad at me.”

It sounded so pathetic, but it was true.  Or it seemed that way, at least.

Mark laughed, but the sound was filled with anger, with the hatred that Mark radiated whenever Gavin was around.

“You don't have any idea why, do you?” he asked, and Gavin shook his head.  No, he didn't, not really, but he would like to.  “You sing my own songs better than me.  You're younger than me, you're hotter than me, but worst of all, you do it all with these huge innocent eyes.  Like you don't even know what you're doing.  You won't even own the fact that you're obviously trying to replace me.”

“You think I want to replace you?”  Gavin stared at Mark, utterly shocked.  That was an utterly ridiculous concept to him, that someone like him could even hope to replace Mark.  “That's insane.  Why would I want to replace the lead singer of my favorite band of all time?  That just doesn't make sense.”

Mark turned to look at him, and Gavin shivered.  Mark believed it.  He believed every insane thing he was saying.

“Maybe you're not doing it on purpose.  I don't know.  But you are doing it, and you're acting like you're not.”

“Because I'm
not
!”  Mark arched a skeptical eyebrow, and Gavin groaned softly.  What a mess this all was.  “Would you like me to go back to my shit job, Mark?  Just so that you don't have to deal with your ridiculous, immature jealousy?”

It took a lot for Gavin to get angry, but this frustrating encounter had done it.

“Look, I don't really wish bad things on you or anything.  You're damn good, you deserve everything you've gotten,” Mark said.

That was an obvious attempt to placate him, but for Gavin, it just made him more angry.

“Oh, wonderful.  You don't actively wish bad things for me.  I'm glad that you don't have a voodoo doll of me or something.  I mean, that's definitely the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me.”  The anger was better than the confusion, and Gavin embraced it.  “Mark, get out of my room.  I need to sleep.  And while you're at it, get over yourself and stop being such a jealous idiot.”

Suddenly, Mark reached for him, grabbing Gavin's shoulders.  He pulled him close, and Gavin gasped.  Mark was so damn huge, so strong, and he so easily pulled Gavin around to wherever he wanted him.

“Yeah, I am a jealous idiot.  Except that this is my life, and I earned it just as much as you earned yours.  Only you're doing it better.  Yeah, I'm a little bitter, whether you deserve it or not.”

Gavin looked into those stormy gray eyes, and sighed softly. 

“I deserve to not have you be an asshole to me because you're hitting your midlife crisis, or whatever's going on with you.  I deserve not to be treated like shit because your ego requires constant stroking.”

Something got dark in Mark's eyes then.  Dark and terrifying, promising that Gavin would suffer for what he'd said.  In a flash, Mark had jumped to his feet and had grabbed the back of Gavin's head, forcing him to bend over his own bed.  Just one more humiliation among many from this man.

He couldn't have expected what happened next, though.  He'd had some sort of dim thought, panicky but also strangely hopeful, that Mark might take down his underwear and fuck him right then and there.

“Mark, what are you doing?” Gavin asked, hating the sound of his own voice.  Being manhandled like this was frightening, but it was also strangely arousing, because it was Mark doing it to him.

“You deserve this, and you deserve that,” Mark ranted.  “You deserve everything, you fucking little brat.”  Still holding him down with one hand on the back of his neck, Mark's other hand settled on Gavin's tight little ass, then slammed down onto it, hard.

Mark smacked his ass again, and then once more, his strong hand rising and falling, each slap echoing through the room. 

“Stupid little slut.” 
Spank.
  “Playing shirtless on
my
stage.” 
Spank.
“Turning on
my
fans.” 
Spank.
  “And acting all innocent when the whole time you're driving me completely insane.”  Two more blows to his ass, which was burning.  Mark wasn't holding anything back.

Suddenly Mark was gone.  He was no longer holding Gavin bent over the bed, and Gavin's legs, just as surprised as the rest of him, had him falling off of the bed onto the floor.  He'd been spanked as a child, but never as an adult. 

Probably the most confusing part of it was just how desperately hard his cock was, how his whole body was aching with arousal even as his ass burned with the pain of being beaten so badly.

“If you feel that way,” Gavin said quietly as Mark pulled open the door to leave.  “Then I guess it's best you stay away from me from now on.”

That was best.  That meant Gavin didn't have to deal with his incredibly strange reactions to being held down like that.  To being spanked, degraded, humiliated once more.  What the hell was wrong with him?  With them both?

There was a bitter laugh from the doorway, but Mark didn't say anything.  Just like that, he was gone, and the door slammed shut behind him.

Shaking, unsure of what to do with any of this, Gavin forced himself to his feet.  Trembling, he fell onto his bed, grabbing the bottle of whiskey that Mark had left behind.  Oh, there was something so very wrong with him.

He wanted to track Mark down, bend him over, and spank him, just as Mark had done to him.  He wanted to demand that Mark bend him over and keep spanking him.  He wanted Mark.  He wanted him so damn badly, and that was never, ever going to happen.

With a groan, he reached down and gripped his aching cock.  It took hardly anything to bring him to a stunning orgasm, but it was just as confusing as everything else because what really made him come hard was feeling the bed put pressure against his sore, abused ass.

He didn't want his own hand, but it was all he had, and it was better than nothing.  The orgasm he gave himself was enough that he could sleep, which was something.

With Mark, he knew, it would have been better.