Laying a Ghost (20 page)

“It makes more sense than turning away from it.” John brushed his thumb slowly across Nick’s cheek and then took a deep breath, letting his hand fall away. “I told you I’ll be seeing my mother this afternoon. She’ll be asking about you and I’m going to have to tell her a pack of lies. I don’t -- I don’t
like
that. I don’t mind keeping quiet about what you do, because that’s not my business, but not telling her I’ve met someone when you’re all I’m thinking about --” He sighed. “I’ll try. I’ll maybe try to tell her if it’s what you want.”

Part of Nick wanted to say yes, but regardless of what he wanted, it was too soon for John. He could see that. “No. There’s no hurry, is there? I’m not going anywhere.” Maybe if he kept repeating that it would help.

“I hope not.” John sounded as definite about that as he’d been unsure about confiding in his mother He cleared his throat as they turned and began to walk back to the house. “The ghosts -- I’m right that you don’t want them mentioning then?”

“I wouldn’t ask you to lie for me.” Nick glanced down, realizing that there was sand in his shoes. “But if you could not mention them, yeah, that’d be good. It’s just ... well, like you said, it would change the way people think of me, and I haven’t even had a chance to convince them that I’m okay yet. You know?”

John nodded. “And you’re thinking I’ve had thirty years to be convincing, and it’s time I took a chance?” It was said lightly enough to make it sound like a way out of the disagreement rather than a return to it. “You could be right.”

They reached the grass and Nick paused to kick off his shoes and empty them of the sand.

“When we get back, you owe me a cup of tea. Or would that be taking advantage of you, seeing as I’ve done no more than climb a ladder and turn a key?”

The amount of sand that Nick was shaking out of his shoe was scary. “You’ve done a lot more than that.” Nick crouched down and tied his laces. “I think I probably owe you more than tea.”

“‘Something else to take the taste away ...’” John quoted thoughtfully. Nick glanced up slowly and felt his doubts and disappointment melt away because John was
looking
at him, his eyes warm with need, and there wasn’t anything Nick wanted to change about that expression. “You never did tell me exactly what you meant by that.”

Standing up, Nick didn’t do anything to hide his desire from showing on his face. “Come on back to the house and I’ll show you.”

* * * * *

John wondered if Nick knew just how good he looked pressed back against a door with his mouth kissed wide-open and his shirt undone. With a hand that he resolutely refused to allow to tremble, he reached down and slid the button on Nick’s jeans free and pulled down the zip.

“This is where you tell me there’s a bed waiting behind us,” he murmured, sliding to his knees and managing to kiss his way down Nick’s chest and stomach as he did it. “And I don’t listen because it’d mean stopping kissing you for a good three seconds to get there.”

“We have time,” Nick gasped, tangling his hand in John’s hair and, when John glanced up at him, licking his swollen lips. “I don’t care about the bed. I just -- oh God, John.” His final words accompanied John’s first lick across the tip of Nick’s cock, now freed and in his hand. It was hard and twitching like it had a mind of its own, which John knew from personal experience it probably did.

“I’ll let you get to it in a minute,” John promised before running his tongue around the head in a slow spiral that ended up with Nick’s cock deep in his mouth. He held it there, loving the way he had to shape his lips around it, welcoming the slight ache in his jaw muscles, and then pulled back, closing his mouth just a little, so that every inch exposed was dragged past his teeth. He grinned as Nick’s hand tightened, tugging hard at his hair. “Count to sixty --”

“Count? What’s that?” Nick’s head had tipped back against the door and his eyes were shut, but John closed his mouth around the head of Nick’s cock again and applied suction and Nick obediently started, “One. Two. Ah ... three.”

John lifted his head and gave him an amused look. “I didn’t mean aloud.” He brought his other hand up to stroke lightly across Nick’s balls and then nuzzled into them, exploring the texture of the skin and inhaling the warm, musky smell that was already familiar, because it was Nick, and he didn’t feel like a stranger when they were doing this, and he never had. “In fact, if you managed to get to sixty, I’d be worried I was doing something wrong.”

“You’re not doing anything wrong.” Nick’s voice sounded soft and hoarse. “Fuck ...” His hand caressed John’s hair, thumb tracing the back edge of John’s ear as John applied his tongue in a long, wide lick that had Nick’s hips pushing forward. “God, you’re good at that.”

“Think ... with you ... I could be good at a lot of things,” John managed to say, too caught up in what he was doing to be anything but brief. He had memories of doing this to other men, in other rooms. Memories that had filled his head as his hand worked his cock in the night, experiencing a frustration that made each climax a reminder of his loneliness rather than a relief from it. Somehow he couldn’t see himself ever bothering to think of them again.

Not when the lightest of touches from Nick’s hand left him aching for more.

Nick pushed forward again and John shifted his hands to Nick’s hips, his fingers spread, and pushed him back against the door, holding him still while he took him in as deeply as he could, swirling his tongue around the shaft and then curling it back to tease at the tip of it.

The sound that Nick made went straight to John’s own cock -- a combination between a groan and a whimper, one of his hands moving to cover John’s on his thigh. The taste on John’s tongue was faintly salty and less bitter than he was familiar with, as if there was something about Nick that was purer than other men, a thought that would have made John laugh at himself if his mouth hadn’t been otherwise occupied.

“John,” Nick breathed. “God. Oh.”

John twisted his hand under Nick’s, linking their fingers, needing something to hold onto as he lost himself in the pleasure of doing everything he could to make Nick happy. And he
knew
when he was. As he’d told him, there was something so open about Nick’s responses, and John, who was used to encounters carried out for the most part in silence, rushed and rarely tender, was finding that he could match it with an unexpected eloquence of his own without feeling ridiculous.

And every whispered, whimpered, encouraging sound he got just made him want more.

He rubbed his hand over Nick’s hip, over the sharp jut of bone, stroking his thumb over the smooth hollow beside it and feeling Nick’s stomach muscles contract. He wanted to lie beside Nick and find every place on his body where a touch made him shiver or squirm helplessly as he giggled. Wanted to spend hours kissing him, just that, nothing more -- and he’d fucked people in under five minutes, and he wanted that too, but with Nick it’d be different. It wouldn’t be impersonal and a bare step up from jerking off. No; it’d be because the two of them were so aroused they couldn’t make it last. He could see that happening; a look or a smile from Nick bringing him to a place where all that would matter would be getting inside him, with Nick’s eyes darkening the way they did, and his mouth inviting a hard, needy kiss, and he’d be smiling, exultant and waiting as John took him where he stood, against a wall, bent over a counter or a chair, urgent and loving and --

John moaned around Nick’s cock, sucking fiercely at it, hungry for the moment when Nick would stiffen and arch and come, wanting to hear him cry out. His own cock was hard enough that it’d take no more than a touch to make him come, but he didn’t mind waiting, and that was new, too.

A strangled sound escaped Nick, fingers tightening on John’s and a dull thud radiating through him as his head thumped back against the solid wood of the door. “John ...” He was quivering, his breathing ragged and quick, so tense that John couldn’t help but be impressed by his ability to hold back.

He redoubled his efforts, licking and sucking. Nick was gasping his name with every breath now, his desperation fairly pouring off him.

“Oh God.” Nick’s words were blurring together. “Oh God ...” And he came, bucking forward into John’s willing mouth, pulsing and throbbing and crying out, flooding John’s tongue with the taste of him as he trembled and groaned.

Reluctantly, John let Nick’s cock slide free of his mouth, contenting himself with a final kiss against the slippery skin before standing up on legs gone wobbly. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and then rested his forehead against Nick’s, holding him to him. “Come and lie down with me. If we can make it that far.”

“I don’t know,” Nick said shakily. “I’m feeling pretty attached to this door right now.” His hand, slender but strong, settled on the back of John’s neck and pulled him in close for a kiss stuttered by Nick’s still-uneven breathing.

Together, they moved toward the bed. Nick removed John’s shirt and dropped it to the floor, skimming his palms over John’s chest and stomach, lips pressing a line of hot kisses to John’s already heated flesh as he undid the front of John’s trousers and let them fall. Then he lay back on the bed, looking no less attractive for the fact that his cock was half softened now, and pulled at John, who kicked his legs free of the rest of his clothes and joined him.

Nick’s hand closed around John’s erection, making him gasp.

“Tonight --” John tried to distract himself because he was so close to coming, so ready ... “Can I come back here? I want to be with you.” He thought about how their sleep had been interrupted the night before and pushed his concerns aside. He hoped that it wouldn’t happen again, but if it did, at least he knew what to expect. He raised himself up on his elbow and stared down at Nick, putting his hand over Nick’s where it held him. “Want to fuck you until you’re past talking and sleep beside you. And if you move your hand, I’m going to come, I swear it. Christ, Nick, I don’t know what you do to me --”

“I
want
to make you come,” Nick said huskily. “Hopefully lots of times.”

John groaned and closed his eyes, hoping to hold off just a bit longer, and certain that he wouldn’t be able to if he had to keep looking at Nick. Without meaning to, he tightened his grip on Nick’s hand, and Nick seemed to take that as indication that he could begin to stroke him, and John was poised on the brink, his heart thundering in his chest as he waited to fall.

“Come,” Nick whispered. “Come back tonight, come back tonight and fuck me, just ... come.”

John let his hand fall away in mute surrender and turned his head into Nick’s shoulder, kissing it blindly as his body obeyed, his mouth open on a gasp. As he came, he bit down hard, feeling Nick shudder with him as they clung to each other, sharing what John was feeling as he had done when Nick had come.

He raised his head when he felt capable of talking and stared at the mark he’d left with his teeth. It wasn’t deep enough to have cut the skin, but deep enough to bruise it. John brushed his lips over the mark and glanced at Nick. “I’ll apologize for hurting you, but I don’t think I’d be convincing if I said I’m sorry I did it.”

“I don’t care.” Nick kissed John hard enough to make them both moan. “It doesn’t bother me.” They rearranged themselves a bit, got settled into a more comfortable position with John’s mouth next to Nick’s shoulder and an arm around his waist. “If you want to come back for dinner, I’ll cook,” Nick offered. “Although I can’t promise it will be anything more than edible.”

“I’d like that.” John was feeling peaceful and sleepy and sated. “And I haven’t forgotten I promised to take you fishing. I’m not much of a cook myself, but it’s hard to ruin mackerel an hour out of the water. Maybe tomorrow we can go out on the sea? Not that there’s not work to be done here, but I’m thinking you should take a bit of time to get used to the place. Relax a bit.”

“If you want.” Nick’s hand traced across John’s shoulder, the touch firm enough that it didn’t tickle. “Or we could go up that mountain. The one we were looking at before?” He shifted, rolling over onto his stomach and propping his head up on his hand as he looked at John. “I kind of like the idea of seeing it. You know, a place you went when you were younger.” He made a face. “Did that sound way too ... I don’t know, romantic?”

John shook his head, feeling touched. “No. Besides, by the time you get to the top, you’ll be sweaty and bitten to death. Does that make you feel better?” He stroked down the long line of Nick’s back and let his hand rest in the hollow at its base. “I’m not looking for you to bring me flowers,” he said. “But I think I could stand you being romantic now and then.”

Chapter Ten

John let his mother add another cake to her plate and smiled. The periodic announcement that she was dieting was about the only effort she actually made to do so, but it didn’t matter. Her sixtieth birthday was two days away, and she was still pretty, the red hair he hadn’t inherited, and the blue eyes he had, unfaded and bright.

The weekly visit was something she’d insisted on when he’d moved out. He was supposed to pay over his rent, but they’d long since arranged for a more prosaic transfer of funds from his account to hers, and now it was just a chance to catch up.

Not that they didn’t see each other during the rest of the week. For a woman who did as much as Anne McIntyre, she always seemed to be at home when he called by, and if she thought he needed to talk she could clear the room of assorted offspring and grandchildren with a look.

And sometimes, in the year since his father’s death, he’d been the one doing the listening.

Leaving Nick’s bed -- leaving Nick -- had been something he would only have done for her, but he hadn’t minded. Even if showering away every trace of what he’d been doing felt less like common cleanliness and more like the first stage in a deception.

Nick’s words on the beach were still with him. He’d had time to think as he walked back across the fields, and he’d done nothing with it but circle around a problem all their talking had done nothing but define.