“MARK?”HE ROSE FROMthe table and reached out his hand toward me.
The deep voice was both questioning and hopeful. No one had called me by that name in many, many years. I looked into the dark eyes that had been burned into my brain, my soul. It had been more than twenty years since I last saw Mitch and he said a tearful goodbye. He had been nervous about the changes coming up in his life and he clung to me longer than normal; I had become the only person he trusted. He promised he’d see me again, but I knew better. As it turned out, Mitch was right. I just didn’t think our reunion would take so long.
“Mitch?” I asked, shaking his hand.
I didn’t hesitate when Jackson Miller called and asked me to meet him and a potential employer for lunch. Hell, I didn’t even ask the name of the client because I was out of work thanks to that son of a bitch, Damien Diamond. He managed to get me fired from the security company I worked for by making up lies about me. He told them I was violent and he and the band felt unsafe around me. My supervisor didn’t give me a chance to defend myself against the accusations either. I was fired and that was final.
Jackson was someone I had worked with at the company until he had been hired away to work privately for a CEO. He told me that his employer needed a new head of security since Jackson was getting married and moving. Jackson felt that I’d be a good fit with his employer and had made the recommendation to him.
“Hey, you guys know each other?” Jackson asked bemusedly.
“Sir.” A soft voice and a gentle nudge woke me from my sleep. “We’ll be landing soon and I need for you to put your tray up and fasten your seatbelt.”
“Uh, sure.”
I rubbed my eyes and stretched my neck to the left and right to wake myself up and get the blood flowing away from my dick and back to my brain. Thankfully, the dream stopped right there and didn’t morph into one of my steamier dreams of Mitch. The sexual frustration was warping my brain and making me insane.
I must’ve been out of my mind to accept a position as head of his security team because it put me so close to the person I wanted more than life, but could never have. Mitch was so far out of my league, but that didn’t stop the hunger. Yeah, I knew he wanted to fuck me because he made that obvious with every flirty glance and the aggressively hot things he said to me when we were alone. Somehow, someway I had resisted him for over a year, ever since the day I began working for him. I had refused to be led around by my dick and I figured that Mitch would be done with me as soon as we scratched that itch. I heard how he was with other men and I didn’t expect to last any longer than they did. So, I deflected his attention by pretending not to take him serious.
Mitch’s sexual exploits had become legendary amongst his security team. I’d heard many stories of his bawdy behavior and conquests, but luckily I’d never seen them with my own eyes. I didn’t want to see another man proudly exit the bedroom on Mitch’sfuck suitewhile Mitch lazily sipped cognac from a glass that probably cost more than my annual salary. I didn’t want to overhear the obvious sounds of sex coming from the room or inside his office as I waited to escort him to his next location. I didn’t want Mitch to mean anything to me, but yet he was the person I turned to covered in Damien Diamond’s, aka Erik Schafnitz, blood from the beating I gave him once I found out what he’d done to Xavier.
It was the night I nearly gave in to the hunger clawing at my gut to have him. I’d like to say I didn’t know what stopped me, but I did. I wanted to be more to Mitch again. I was once his entire world and I remembered how great that felt. I was convinced he’d look right through me if he had his way, so I decided to take the pieces of him I could have and let that be enough. Unfortunately for me, I made that decision after we kissed. The memory of the way his lips felt pressed against mine has haunted me, taunted me.
I diverted my thoughts away from Mitch and onto the legal troubles I was facing as a result of the beating I gave Damien. All I knew was that he was alive when I left; I wasn’t the one to put a bullet in his brain. Those thoughts kept me distracted during the landing and the time it took me to locate my ride. Mitch had told me that he’d send his driver, Richard, after me so finding him parked at the curb was not a surprise, but Mitch sitting in the back of the luxury car at an ungodly hour was.
His dark eyes scrutinized me sharply under the interior lighting of the car. No matter how much his face matured or his body had grown, his dark eyes remained the same. Hot. Hungry. Seeking. My skin tingled with awareness at his proximity and I was grateful when the lights dimmed once the door was shut behind me. It would be so easy for me to get lost in the bottomless depths of his eyes and the touch of his skin against mine. I knew if I leaned into him right then that my advances would be eagerly met and returned.
“Are things better now between you and yourfriend?” Mitch asked once I was settled in the seat beside him. I heard the change of tone in his voice and for a minute I hoped he was jealous. Then I checked my thoughts and began to wonder if perhaps I was going insane. Why would Mitch be jealous of Xavier? Unless, he thought Xavier was the reason why I wouldn’t fuck him.
“Much better.” I smiled as I thought about the happiness I saw on Xavier’s face as he played around with his lover in the kitchen and the way he curled into him as I told him about what happened between me and Damien. Xavier was in love and in a healthy relationship and I couldn’t have been happier for him.
“I see,” Mitch said sourly. I realized then that Mitch might’ve misconstrued the smile on my face as me remembering intimate moments with Xavier. If I had been smart, I should’ve let him go on believing that, but no one had ever waxed poetically about my smarts.
I looked Mitch in the eyes and said, “Xavier’s in love and happy, so I’m happy.” I could tell by the narrowed look he gave me that he wasn’t convinced I was telling the truth. “Xavier is a good friend, nothing more.”
“You wanted it to be something more at some point though, right?” After all the years that passed between us, he could still read me so well.
“Yes.” My answer was given in a soft, but firm voice.
“So, why didn’t you act on it? I can’t imagine he didn’t want you just as badly.” Mitch sounded perplexed that people didn’t just take what they wanted and it was another glaring reason that nothing could ever develop between us.
I turned and looked at him, but I couldn’t see his features clearly in the dark. It didn’t matter, because they were burned into my brain. I knew that his eyes were still hypnotically dark, he was starting to get a little gray at the temples, which I found to be sexy as hell, and he had little lines forming around the corners of his eyes. The handsome boy grew into the most gorgeous, unattainable man I’d ever known.
“I don’t know if he returned the attraction, but it wouldn’t have mattered because he was in a relationship with someone else. Even though it wasn’t a healthy relationship, I respected that he wasn’t mine to pursue.” Had I known how truly bad Damien treated Xavier I would’ve moved heaven and earth to get him away sooner.
“That’s bullshit, Mark.”
I tried telling him on several occasions that no one called me by that name anymore, but he didn’t care. I would always be Mark to him. He wanted to see me as Mark so therefore I was. End of story to him. He felt the same way about the men he wanted. He adamantly said he never engaged in sex with men in relationships; he didn’t have to. He’d toss them a wink, a kind word, and whisper dirty words in their ears and they were all his for the taking.
“We don’t operate the same way, Mitch.” Bitter bile rose in my throat as I thought about the changes in the boy I once loved. The Mitch I knew was kind and considerate, but the man he became was selfish and greedy. I didn’t know if it was from the effect of wealth and privilege or something deeper that had made him a shallow man. I suspected there were multiple reasons. “Let’s just leave it at that.”
“Fine.”
I turned my head to look out the window so he wouldn’t see the smile on my face brought on by his little huffy reply. He was so used to getting his way with everyone but me. I was pretty certain that had been the reason for his hot pursuit of me. If he knew how badly I wanted to take him up on his offer, then he’d never let up. Right then, I needed to focus on clearing my name and not getting my dick sucked or any of the dozens of things I’d imagined doing to and with Mitch.
“What time do I need to be at the police station tomorrow?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Ten o’clock. Duncan will meet us there at nine forty-five,” Mitch replied.
