A Place for Cliff (10 page)

Willing himself not to push too far he let Cliff go and enjoyed the color show on Cliff’s face.

Cliff fingered his lips savoring the touch, but still red in the face he glanced over at his sister who was watching with a bright expression bordering on giggling at him. As if it was the most natural thing for her to see her brother do. His eyes then shifted to the older man watching with his usual amusement of him, “Are you going to continue to do that in front of everybody?” He asked nervously.

Pyotr grinned down at him, “Eventually.” And kissed him lightly on the forehead.

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CHAPTER FOUR

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Two weeks had passed since their first night together and it showed little sign of slowing down. Proving Pyotr to be true to his word that he had a voracious sexual appetite. As was his gentle command to be in charge of their relationship.

Cliff was just finishing up his shift at work restocking the ambulance before he could clock out when he happened to glance up and saw Pyotr standing just outside the garage. He froze, uncertain of what to expect or what was expected of him. It had him thrown off his guard a bit. Pyotr had never come by his place of work before.

Pyotr only stood there, a tall and handsome silhouette in the backlighting of the outdoor sunshine. So refined his lover was, but Pyotr’s stance gave no indication of
why
he was there.

“Hey Cliff!” Ozzy, their driver called back from the front seat of the ambulance calling his attention away from the man standing at the drive, “don’t forget to grab a trachea kit and we gotta turn in an inventory count today.”

“Shit, alright I’ll get it started in a minute.” He turned back to Pyotr, but the man was gone.

It was as if he’d never been there at all. Why hadn’t Pyotr mentioned he might come by to see him? It was something Pyotr would have discussed with him. Cliff after all was at work and had not officially come
out
yet. Pyotr never once seemed to be in a hurry to push him either. Everything done in strides. Sometimes those strides felt so slow Cliff could imagine a snail could gain the lead on them. He shook his head at himself—at his own thoughts. Chances are he was just letting him know he was offering a lift and he’d be parked around the corner or something waiting, no big deal.

He pushed off and headed for the stock room again, for the trachea kit they used at the start of their shift as well as a few more IV lines. He pushed open to the hall, but before turning into the supply room he heard Pyotr’s voice—and Sasha’s.

He shot passed the supply room, his steps quickened until he reached the break room and came to a full stop. Eyes snared on his lover standing squarely in front of Sasha. He felt the crushing pang in his chest. The feeling growing more intense when Sasha turned looking at him. Cliff didn’t even know what the look intended to say but he knew what his heart was saying; it was screaming that he’d just lost his lover to another before he’d had the chance to realize how much he actually felt.

“You need something Cliff?” Sasha asked, he almost sounded as if Cliff’s presence was interfering.

Bastard—Sasha already had two lovers, he was even married to them. Now he wanted Pyotr?

Panic hit. And he quickly turned, mind focused on his feet. He needed to get out of there—fast, but without running and tripping in his hast to flee. He cleared the hall, he could feel his panic boiling in him now. Pitched up from a storm of feelings caving in on him. He passed the ambulance truck and out the roll door of the garage. Bright sunlight hit his face and for a moment he didn’t feel like the world was caving in on him. He stopped, leaning back on the brick wall of the building, eyes squeezed as tight as he could force them. He pitched his head up into the sun and tried to get his breathing under control. His thoughts and his emotions were beyond his command. But he knew how to keep them silent, years of watching his baby sister grow sicker and weaker—face down in the hospital bed while the doctors drilled into his hip bones with the marrow tube drawing out the samples of his bone marrow, wide awake with no anesthesia to dull the excruciating pain… the day he came home from the hospital after Kimmi started chemo therapy again to find their parents had packed up everything and were gone—he survived all that—he could get through this.

“Cliff.”

Cliff tried to freeze at the sound of his name, but he couldn’t prevent the quiver that went to his lip. He refused to open his eyes.
This time it was different
, he’d gotten through all those other things cause he had to be strong for Kimmi. Here Pyotr was the strong one; Pyotr promised that when they were together the world didn’t have to be carried on his shoulders. When he was with Pyotr he was free and that freedom found love. He wouldn’t get through this as easily.

“Cliff.” Pyotr’s voice came directly in front of him now.  “Look at me Cliff.” The command was tender.

Cliff took a deep breath and let it out slow and steady, then opened his eyes to see Pyotr standing just a few steps in front of him. Not too close that he would be in his personal space, but close enough he could see the concern on the man’s face. And the question.

“You came here to see Sasha?”

“Yes I did.”

Cliff closed his eyes again, but he didn’t drop his head. The only thing saving him right now was the warmth of the sun.

Pyotr watched him intently, watching the small twitches of muscle in the young man’s shoulders and his arms held straight at his sides, his palms flattened on the wall behind him as if hanging on so the sea of emotions could not wash him away. His face save the quiver in his lip was perfectly still, frozen in the sun light. The bright rays glistening off his hair making the gold color all the more brilliant. Even in his emotional turmoil his young lover was beautiful and dear, far more then he gave himself credit for.

“What is it you are feeling right now?” and then Pyotr saw it. Cliff would not have needed to answer the question for him to know what he was feeling; the pain was all over his face right now.

But Cliff answered anyways, “It hurts.”

“When you saw me talking with Sasha it made you hurt?” The questioned designed to get to the root of the problem.

A deep breath filled his chest strengthening him, “Yes.”

“Well at least it’s a healthy feeling.” He rocked back on his heels and shoved his hands into his pockets.

Cliff’s eyes shot open, “What is so damn healthy about pain?”

“Had it been jealousy we would of had a problem with it, but if you’re hurting because you saw me with another man and didn’t understand, then at least we both know now that you have deeper feelings for me—feelings I share with you.”

“Who is Sasha to you?” Cliff was through exposing his feelings and wanted the real answer, but before Pyotr could answer his question Sasha had stepped out discovering the two of them together.

“Pyotr what is this?”

Determined not to lose Pyotr without a fight Cliff grabbed his lover by the collar of his shirt yanked the taller man into him, his other arm shooting around his head and pulled Pyotr to his mouth and kissed him in front of Sasha and the whole world to see.

Pyotr felt his young lover’s tongue brush between his lips demanding entrance. A fun note clicked in his head. He knew what this was and decided that if this was what his young lover needed, he would allow it even if it were being wasted on his baby brother. Pyotr pulled his hands from his pockets and moved around Cliff’s waist then down over his hips and pulled him tight against his groin holding their bodies firmly pressed into each other seamlessly from cock to lip. He was all about stride, but by god when it was time nothing was allowed to be subtle or half ass and he took over their kiss. His tongue lathed deep into Cliff’s mouth swirling against his lover’s tongue and licked at him drawing him to probe deeper in his mouth. Lips cracked from each other only enough so both could suck in a breath then deepened again. Pyotr never let go of his young lover’s hips and Cliff didn’t let go of him til both were satisfied their claim on each other had been announced.

Pyotr pulled back and smiled when Cliff tried to follow his lips. “And how do you feel now?”

Cliff let his head fall back a bit looking up at his lover’s face and how he smiled at him. Warm and welcoming. “Comfortable.”

“That’s a healthy feeling too,
draga
. Look around you now. How does it feel to take your first step out?”

Cliff glanced around at the cars that drove by and the woman walking with a stroller on the sidewalk, but whatever he was thinking or feeling from the start came to a standstill when he glanced at Sasha standing there gawping at them, then looked back to Pyotr for an explanation.

“Sasha is my baby brother.” Pyotr grinned as if he’d just let the joke out.

Cliff dropped his head on the man’s chest, rocking it from side to side, “Now I feel silly.”

Pyotr reached up and stroked the thick golden strands of hair petting him then pushed his head to lift for him. He touched his face then slipped a finger under his chin. “My dear
Draga
, silly looks good on you too, right now.” And he completed the compliment with a soft kiss. “How much longer before you are finished here?”

“Just a few more things to put in the truck then paper work.”

“Good.” He gave him a peck on the forehead. “We will spend the evening at your place tonight. I will be there waiting for you when you get home.” Another chaste kiss and he stepped off right passed his brother.

“You?” Sasha gaped at his work partner.

Cliff’s smile quirked to one side then he turned on his heels and went back in to finish his work.

Sasha took off after his brother, “Wait!” he ran up catching up with him at the end of the building. “Cliff is your lover? Cliff Patterson, as in I’m gonna be the next Dominus Cliff Patterson?”

Pyotr stopped and looked at him as he stepped up.

“You can’t be serious?” Sasha protested at him.

Pyotr looked over to the spot where his young lover had just kissed him for all to see, the youthful display that shouted
he’s mine
—and he smiled at it. A silly little display really, yet he had thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact his heart was swelling that his little lover needed to stake a public claim.

“What was that back there? And don’t think I didn’t over hear you call him
Honey
—you’d never use a Serbian pet name on a casual fuck.”

Pyotr’s hand shot out. Too fast for Sasha to react and shoved him hard against the brick wall. His fingers splayed out just hovering over the younger man’s chest asserting his dominance, that Sasha stay right where his brother put him. “Do not over step yourself. I may be a gentle handler, but those limits do not include you.”

“You can’t possibly be happy with Cliff?” Sasha kept still, but not his thoughts or his opinion of his brother’s poor choice for a lover.

“On the contrary, I find myself very happy with him. For once I do not need to fix someone’s head just so it’s possible to have a relationship with them. He is a grown man and very capable. And his body fits my desires perfectly—lean but enough muscle that he still feels like a man underneath me.”

“A lot of the people we pick up are bigger than the gurneys we carry them on.” Sasha quipped as if he’d said it a thousand times. But he knew what his brother meant; Pyotr would never sleep with someone who felt like a boy.

Pyotr forced a chuckled, “He said the very same thing.”

“But Pyotr—” Sasha still pleaded for him to reconsider, “he’s younger then I am.”

Pyotr rocked back on his heels. There was that. Cliff was twenty two years under him.  A far stretch for lovers, yet neither seemed to feel it was worth getting in the way of them. “Yes. Yes he is and we have discussed it between ourselves, but we have decided that we are both very comfortable with it.
Perhaps
in ten years we may feel differently, but then such is a thing in all relationships. Some time down the road one or both partners may feel differently about each other. We will deal with it when the time comes.”

“But you’re investing in a relationship you know has an ending. Don’t do this to yourself.” Sasha half argued, half pleaded. Pyotr had a big heart he’d kept their entire family together at the cost of not having one of his own. Now that everyone was grown up his brother deserved a lover above them all, but one that he could take as his forever. Sasha just couldn’t bear watching his older brother get caught up in the revolving door of lovers.

“If I have ten years of happiness or maybe only one, it will be worth having, because everything else is right. Do you not say the same about your Isaiah?”

Sasha took a deep breath almost daring to bow up at his brother, but quickly relented back against the wall again, only allowing his breath to escape in a hard sigh. He was so protective of his boys it was hard not to react to Pyotr’s comment, but he knew better. He knew Pyotr had not said it to be threatening or derogatory. Only pointing out that some relationships came with conditions and as worrisome as those conditions may be their outcomes weren’t always predetermined either.

Pyotr was so much like their father in many ways but one—Pyotr was also just like their mother. He was the best of both all rolled into one body. He was strong willed and strong in his body. He was the one who always brought an end to the fights between him and the rest of their brothers and there had been plenty of those. He was even known to bring down a few street thugs in his time, dragging them down the middle of the street by their toes and sit on them in the most humiliating ways until they agreed to stop wrecking havoc on the neighborhood. Most of that was set loose on the Irish in the neighborhood. But Pyotr knew how to be gentle like their mother and when you hurt he knew how to make it better as if he had the box of band-aids for broken hearts. They’re sisters gave him a lot of practice for that.

Eight brothers and two sisters aside, Pyotr had never had his own family and Sasha could see how Cliff and Kimmi filled that need for him. Perhaps too well, because that was a part that was definitely predetermined.