The River Leith (20 page)

Dinner had to wait for another shower, and the blow job Zach offered, and when they sat down with their plates of overcooked food, the stars had come out. They ate on the floor in front of the fireplace, wearing nothing but their boxers. Zach lit a few citronella candles to keep the bugs away, and they flickered and guttered in the breeze from the screen door.

Pushing his empty plate aside, Leith crawled over to Zach, settling down with his head in Zach’s lap. He closed his eyes and rested, listening to Zach eat a few more bites of dinner.

When Zach put his plate on the floor, Leith turned his head to nuzzle at the opening in Zach’s boxers, smelling the musky scent of his pubic hair.

Zach’s hands fell into his hair, and Leith felt an instinctive urge to pull Zach’s cock out and suck it. He wondered at the intensity of this desire, and he sat with it a moment, feeling Zach’s fingers playing in his hair, and the insistent press of Zach’s cock against his cheek His heart rate responded, and a curl of nerves and lust unfurled in his stomach.

He’d done it before, he knew that he had, but he had no memory of it. Could he live up to what Zach expected? Would he know what to do like he had in the bedroom? Why was he thinking about it instead of just doing it? His own cock was growing heavy, too, and he wanted to get his mouth on Zach’s because he knew if he could just forget
—
just give up his worries
—
he’d love it.

He closed his eyes, and took several slow breaths. Then he kneeled, reached into Zach’s boxers, and pulled out Zach’s hot, smooth cock. He studied it in his hand, pretty and a dusky pink, the head brighter than the rest, and he pulled the foreskin up and down a little, watching Zach’s hips respond. Then he looked into Zach’s eyes, and laughing a little at the hot desire there, asked, “Do you like this?”

Zach nodded, swallowing hard. “I like everything with you.”

Leith’s heart was open and vulnerable, and he knew his face reflected it. “I don’t know how to… Not anymore.”

Zach’s eyes grew tender, and he caressed Leith’s cheek. “I’ll love whatever you do.”

Leith quirked a brow and gently gnashed his teeth, pretending to bite.

Zach chuckled. “Oooh, you’re so funny, aren’t you now?”

Leith laughed, relaxing and kissing Zach’s cheek, the stubble scratching against his lips. He ducked down between Zach’s legs, bringing his lips to the tip of Zach’s cock. He kissed it lightly, noting the soft, delicate feel of the skin. He closed his eyes and opened his mouth, taking Zach’s cock in and sucking.

And just like before, it was easy
—
it was like he’d done it a million times, and yet it was all new: the way Zach’s hips lifted and sought more, the bitter taste of Zach’s pre-come coating his tongue, and the scratch of pubic hair against his nose and fist as he jerked the base of Zach’s cock along with his rhythmic sucking.

Zach’s noises from above were soft and high-pitched, somewhat different from the deeper noises he’d made when Leith fucked him. More delicate somehow, and needy. His hands in Leith’s hair were gentle, and Leith remembered how he’d grabbed Zach’s head in the shower. He wanted to make Zach lose control like that too.

He increased the suction and twisted his tongue in Zach’s slit on the upstroke, and Zach’s hands gripped his hair hard. Leith hummed happily, and Zach whimpered, his hips stuttering and his stomach clenching and unclenching against Leith’s cheek.

“Leith,” Zach said, his voice breathy. “Just like that.”

Leith twisted his tongue on every stroke, and Zach hunched over him, his hips twitching. Zach made hot sounds that left Leith quivering, and he reached down to stroke his own cock as he sucked Zach’s. Leith knew even before Zach started to shake and say his name over and over that Zach was going to come.

Zach’s cock swelled a little in his mouth, the skin growing tighter, and Leith pulled up to the head when the spurts began. Zach jerked, and his hands in Leith’s hair tugged hard enough that it hurt. Zach’s orgasm was short, but hard, and when Leith pulled off, swallowing the bitter come and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, Zach’s eyes sparkled with what looked like tears.

Leith touched Zach’s face, tracing the line of stubble with his fingers. “Was it okay?”

Zach laughed through trembling breaths. “I came so hard I think I might have broken something, and you don’t know if it was okay?”

Leith wiped a tear from the corner of Zach’s eye. “But…you’re crying.”

Zach shook his head. “Side effect of great sex. I’m not crying. I’m too happy to cry.”

“No tears of joy from you?” Leith asked, his own cock still hard and aching.

Zach seemed to notice, and kissed Leith’s lips. “Only on the day I knew you’d live…and in the rose garden when you kissed me. When I knew you loved me still.”

He bent to take Leith into his mouth, and Leith blinked back his own tears.

The next two days were amazing. Leith couldn’t think of another word to describe them. They made love, and swam in the lake, and Leith hiked into the mountains while Zach straggled thirty yards behind and complained loudly that he preferred other ways to get sweaty.

Leith found Zach strangely easy to talk to, and he laughed more than could remember laughing in his entire life. Nearly everything about Zach made him
feel
things
—
happiness, amusement, and butterflies in his stomach.

Just listening to Zach talk about something simple like his favorite movies
—
all old Hollywood westerns starring John Wayne
—
made his heart clench with a silly delirious feeling that left him on the verge of giggling like a kid. And little things like the way Zach danced to pop songs as he cooked, so silly and without shame, made Leith want to kiss him until they fell on the floor and ended up having sex again.

Or the way Zach made him feel safe enough to talk about things he didn’t tell anyone else. Like how he’d lost his virginity to Jennifer Dunaway at a party when he was sixteen after being in love with her from afar for over a year.

He’d thought they were going to be together afterward, and he’d been so in love that night, thinking she finally understood why they were meant to be. But the next morning she wanted nothing to do with him, and ended up going out with a violinist with glasses and a weird haircut.

“Who was your first?” Leith asked. He was sitting on the ground beside Zach, poking at the campfire they’d made, shirtless because it was really too hot for a fire. The sky was clear and full of stars, and he’d pointed some out to Zach earlier.

“I don’t remember his name,” Zach said, staring into the flames. He yawned.

“What?” Leith couldn’t imagine not remembering the name of someone he’d had sex with. The last three years being an entirely valid exception, of course.

Zach shrugged. “I was thirteen. I was at this really cool party with some older kids, and I didn’t really know him.”

Leith took a moment to process this.

Zach waved his hand as though pushing the subject away. “It was completely consensual, and I had a very good time. The main thing is, it set me on the path to a very enjoyable period of extreme sexual promiscuity. This was good, because eventually that path of bold derring-do led me to taking a job on a cruise ship. I traveled the world, fulfilling my every lust for life and strange men.”

“Oh.” Leith didn’t know what to think.

Zach smiled, poking at the fire. “And
that
was good because when the time came for me to settle down in New York
—
which isn’t necessarily my absolute favorite city in the world, but it’s the place where I found
you
—
I had no wild oats left to sow, and no regrets about committing to someone I cared about so much. The way I see, not knowing my first’s name seems relatively unimportant in the scheme of it all, because everything about my life led me here to this moment with you.”

Leith nodded slowly, his lower lip out a bit as he tried to appear as though he understood where Zach was coming from. But casual sex had always seemed so unappealing to him that he truly didn’t get it. He knew he was an oddity in that regard.

Unless…something had changed with him. Maybe he and Zach were into threesomes, or group sex. What did he know? Leith shuddered, and felt sick at the idea of sharing Zach with anyone else. “Do we…?” Leith asked, his nose wrinkling with disgust.