Good Bones (11 page)

“You get that all the time?” he asked after the waiter reluctantly left them.

Dylan sighed. “Sometimes.”

Chris’s frown deepened, and they didn’t talk as they waited for their food to arrive. Once they began to eat, though, Chris seemed to defrost a little. “You’re right. This is better than BK. I guess you used to eat in places like this all the time.”

“Pretty often, I guess. You don’t go out much?”

“Not a whole lotta choices near home, dude.”

“No. But, I mean, you do go out sometimes, right? For a burger or a beer?”

“I ain’t a hermit.” Chris chuckled. “I get out into the world now and then, have me a look-see at all them newfangled inventions like cellular phones and personal computin’ machines.” He stole two of Dylan’s french fries and crammed them in his mouth.
Why are my fries always fair game?
Dylan wondered.

“I don’t think you’re a hayseed, Chris. Not anymore. I was just wondering what you do when you’re not… swinging a hammer.”

Chris looked down at his fingers, which were rolling the edge of a napkin. “I do things. Go out. Sometimes I just get in my truck and drive. No plan or anythin’. Just see where the road takes me, you know.” He looked up at Dylan. “You ever do that?” Dylan shook his head.

They finished their food, and the waiter came by with the bill. Dylan ignored the googly eyes again. He paid but didn’t get up right away, and neither did Chris. Finally, Dylan ventured a question he’d been wondering about for some time. “What do you do when you want to hook up with someone? Aside from offering to help him remodel, I mean.”

“There’s places,” Chris answered vaguely. “You didn’t move in next to the only faggot in Columbia County. That rest stop over on Highway 47, sometimes you can get lucky out there. I wasn’t a blushing virgin when we met, dude.”

Dylan grinned at him. “You seemed to know what you were doing.”

That made Chris leer so heatedly that Dylan’s cock stirred. “Let’s go,” he said, standing abruptly. Chris laughed and waggled his fingertips at the waiter as they walked to the door.

Home Depot was fun. Dylan picked out a couple hundred square feet of ceramic tile for the floor and a coordinating pattern for the backsplash. Then he got bags of mud and grout, spacers, plastic barrels, a mixer blade for his drill, and a couple of trowels. The big splurge was a midrange tile saw. He winced a little when it was time to pay the bill, but Chris was almost bouncy. “I like your tools,” he said, helping to load the truck with their purchases and stopping to slap Dylan’s ass.

Traffic was slow as they headed home, but Dylan didn’t mind. He liked sitting next to Chris, listening to him sing, feeling the engine rumble. They chatted on and off, mostly about their construction plans for the next day. But as darkness fell they grew silent, and the cab became somehow more intimate, the air thicker, the heat enough to fog up the windows and create little beads of sweat on their scalps that dripped down their necks. By the time Chris pulled the truck around to the back of Dylan’s house and cut the engine, they might have been the only two people left on earth.

They sat in the dark of the cab, just breathing.

Then Chris twisted a little in his seat and set a heavy hand high on Dylan’s thigh. “God, I want you,” he whispered.

Dylan was slightly embarrassed as a needy little whimper escaped his throat, and then they were kissing hard enough for teeth to clack, and Dylan’s hands were fisted in Chris’s hair, holding him tight. Most of Dylan’s previous sexual experiences hadn’t involved much kissing, and he’d never before realized how much it could feel like fucking when a tongue penetrated his mouth, how the taste of another man could make his balls tingle and his skin feel tight and hot.

When they pulled apart, panting, Chris’s teeth gleamed in the darkness.

They fumbled at one another’s clothing, and Chris half straddled him, but the front seat of a Chevy didn’t offer much room for two grown men. The gear shift was jammed uncomfortably into Dylan’s leg, while half his body was pinned under the big steering wheel. “Let’s take this inside,” he suggested.

Chris kissed him again—this time fast and teasing—and opened the passenger side door. They both tumbled out, nearly ending up in the mud but just barely managing to keep their feet by grabbing at each other and the truck. Dylan’s dick was so hard that it actually hurt to run, but neither man wasted any time rushing into his house. Chris looked around curiously when they got upstairs. It occurred to Dylan that Chris hadn’t seen the second floor yet, although this was no time for a tour. He tugged at Chris’s sleeve and dragged him down to the bedroom.

Chris glanced around at the horrible wallpaper and ugly brown carpet. “
Love
what you’ve done to the place,” he said in a terrible falsetto, flopping both his wrists dramatically.

“Yeah, we’ll get to it eventually, handyman.”

With a grin, Chris walked across the room and sat on the bed. He bounced up and down a few times. “Mattress works.”

“Hold that thought,” said Dylan. He ducked into the bathroom and tried to remember where the hell he’d put the packet of condoms and bottle of lube, neither of which he’d used since the move. There were three cardboard boxes full of miscellaneous crap shoved in the corner—extra towels, a shower squeegee, soap dishes, things like that. He tossed these items everywhere as he burrowed in. Naturally, the two things he was looking for were in the bottom box underneath a half dozen spare boxes of Kleenex. Dylan made a small triumphant noise when the safe-sex paraphernalia were finally in his eager hands. He rushed back into the bedroom—but came to a full stop at the sight before him.

During the time Dylan had been in the bathroom, Chris had managed to strip off every thread of clothing. He was now splayed on his back atop the blankets, heavy-lidded, his legs spread wide and one hand lazily stroking his cock. His other hand was at his chest, the fingers tugging and pinching at an erect nipple.

He lifted one eyebrow at Dylan, who was still goggling. “You gonna fuck me, or what?”

Dylan dropped the stuff in his hands. He didn’t bother to unbutton his shirt—he simply tugged it over his head, along with his T-shirt. He kicked off his Converses and fumbled at his belt, nearly tripping as he attempted to get his jeans and boxers off as quickly as possible. That left only his socks, which he tugged off impatiently.

Chris’s eyes brightened as Dylan undressed, and he licked his bottom lip and smiled. “That’s more like it.”

After retrieving the lube and condoms from the floor, Dylan crossed to the bed. He desperately wanted to touch, but he spent a minute or two simply staring. Chris’s shoulders were wide and his hips narrow. He had kanji characters tattooed on one calf. His muscles were solid and heavy, but as he shifted they moved fluidly beneath his skin, and his nipples were perfect brown peaks. He seemed to enjoy the admiration, because he stopped jacking himself and folded his arms beneath his head. The reddened crown of his cock dripped clear fluid onto his taut belly.

Dylan knelt between Chris’s legs. He dragged his palms down the flat planes of his chest, across the ridges of his abs. Chris arched up slightly into the touch so that Dylan half expected him to start purring. He liked the way Chris’s hair was flopping into his face, half screening his eyes. But then Dylan’s gaze caught on the dark tufts of hair under Chris’s arms. He leaned forward, blanketing Chris’s body with his own, and nuzzled deeply at one armpit, filling his head with Chris’s scent.

Suddenly smelling wasn’t enough—he needed to taste. So he licked at smooth skin and wiry hairs. He traced his tongue down to a rib and then across, stopping to nibble slightly at one brown nub of flesh and then the other. Chris gasped a little at the pressure of teeth but didn’t protest. He tasted good, Dylan decided. Warm and slightly salty, like bread fresh from the oven.

It turned out that Chris was ticklish—he wiggled slightly as Dylan worked his way down the center of his torso. But that was fine. Wiggling was good, especially when it made Chris’s trapped cock slide against Dylan’s chest.

Chris moaned and canted his hips upward when Dylan scooted down to lick at the tender crease between leg and body. But Dylan chuckled and pushed him back down. “Greedy,” he said.

“Tease.”

When Dylan urged Chris’s thighs farther apart, the man obligingly bent his knees and folded his legs to his chest, leaving himself fully exposed. And that was exactly what Dylan had hoped for. With a happy little hum of approval he nosed deeply at the root of Chris’s thick cock, at his heavy balls, at the tender bit of skin behind them. His head swam from the musky, sweet odors. He briefly wondered if it would be possible to come just from scent and taste alone. But then the thought reminded him that he could taste, and he did, lapping delicately at the perineum and then just at the edge of the tight little pucker.

“Jesus Christ! You’re fuckin’ killin’ me, Dylan.”

Oddly enough, although his own untouched cock was throbbing, Dylan was in no hurry. He smiled at Chris’s groans and swearing, and he lapped and tickled around the rim of Chris’s twitching hole. When he finally inserted his tongue, Chris let out a long, relieved, “Fuuuuck.”

Chris’s channel was smooth and silky against Dylan’s tongue, and Chris was rocking slightly, trying to impale himself more deeply. Sweat had gathered under the folds of his knees. It slipped slowly down his thighs until Dylan raised his head and licked it away.

“If your dick is half as talented as your tongue…,” Chris said with a laugh.

“Twice as talented.” Dylan patted Chris’s butt. “Roll over.”

Chris was surprisingly willing to comply. He tucked his knees underneath himself and rested his shoulders on the mattress, raising his magnificent ass high in the air. Dylan spent a long time squeezing and rubbing and licking the muscular curves, then spread the cheeks and bent back down to tongue at—and in—the already moistened hole.

Soon Chris was rocking back and forth rhythmically, little huffs of air escaping noisily from his lungs. “Dyl… goddamn it… God… more!”

Dylan patted his ass again. “Ready for me?”

“Was ready half an hour ago.”

Suddenly Dylan was ready too. He squirted a healthy dollop of lube onto two fingers but didn’t bother to take his time inserting them slowly. Chris’s ring of muscle was already relaxed. He jerked violently and grunted when Dylan deliberately scraped against the spongy little bundle of nerves. “Dylan….”

Dylan’s hands were trembling slightly with excitement as he rolled the rubber onto his cock—the stimulation almost more than he could stand. When he lined himself up and sank inside in one slow thrust, both men moaned in unison.

“God, Chris. So tight.”

“Been a while. You’re—yeah, like that. God, just like that.”

That
was a long, gradual almost-withdrawal, followed by a quick slam back in. Dylan repeated the maneuver several more times, teasing them both, until Chris ordered, “Harder. Harder.”

“Pushy bottom.”

“Goddamn right.”

Just when Dylan felt his balls drawing up tight, when he was in danger of losing himself completely, he stopped, producing an outraged wail from the man beneath him. “Don’t!”

But Dylan wanted more. His skin was hungry for as much contact as possible. He ran his hands up Chris’s spine and tugged at his shoulders until Chris was up on his knees in front of him. Chris’s warm back against Dylan’s front allowed him to reach around and wrap a hand around Chris’s cock. Bucking forward into the grip, then back, Chris twisted an arm behind to grab at Dylan’s torso. He let his head drop back onto Dylan’s shoulder, and Dylan buried his nose in Chris’s soft hair.

Skin slapped loudly against skin, punctuated by Chris’s soft grunts and the thud of their heartbeats. Dylan rocked his hips and stroked with his hand. The sounds, the smells, the goddamn sublime
feel
of burying himself over and over again in Chris’s hot core—his senses overwhelmed him, melding together until he couldn’t tell them apart, couldn’t distinguish which part of him was reacting to what part of Chris. He lost his rhythm completely and just pumped into that warmth until Chris cried out. The odor of Chris’s semen was exactly enough to make Dylan fall apart. He gasped and threw back his head as he came.

It almost hurt to withdraw from Chris’s body. As soon as he did, Chris collapsed onto his forearms with an
oof
. Dylan carefully removed the rubber and padded into the bathroom to throw it away. While he was in there he unearthed a couple of clean washcloths and dampened them at the sink. He didn’t have the patience to wait for the water to get warm, but he knew Chris would be able to deal.

They cleaned themselves without comment. Dylan sat on the edge of the bed and watched as Chris pulled his clothes back on. “Want to come over for dinner?” Chris asked as he bent to tie his shoes.

“No thanks. I think I’ll just have a sandwich or something.”

Chris nodded and stood. His head was bowed a little so his hair hid his face. “I’ll come over and help you unload the truck in the morning.”

“Okay. But let’s wait until Monday to paint. I have some work to get done.”

“Suit yourself.”

Chris turned and walked out the door. The shag carpet muffled his footsteps, but a few moments later Dylan heard the back door slam.

Chapter 10