Someone said it. Grade was pretty sure it was him, but he couldn’t have sworn to it. He swallowed thickly and grabbed at Clay’s shoulders as he wrapped his legs around his waist. Clay chuckled, low and audibly pleased with himself, and pulled away from Grade’s mouth. He grabbed a handful of Grade’s hair and pulled his head back, throat stretched out bare and tight for wet, tongued kisses that traveled down to his collarbone.
“I thought,” Grade said, his voice scratchy in his throat, “this wasn’t how we were playing it.”
Clay bit him, his teeth sharp and rough against Grade’s collarbone, and then pushed himself up on braced arms.
“I changed my mind,” he said. From this angle, his grin looked distinctly predatory, and anticipatory goose bumps ran down Grade’s arms. He bit his lower lip as Clay slowly pulled out of him, his breath caught in his chest as he waited. “That’s the other thing about me. I’m an unpredictable bastard.”
He thrust into Grade with one quick stroke. It would have made Grade moan, but the sound stuck in his throat as pleasure flooded under his skin. He dug his fingers into Clay’s shoulders, his nails pressed down against an inked skull and bike, respectively, as he lifted his hips to meet the thrust. It felt so good it almost hurt. Or the other way around.
The bed creaked sporadically as each thrust drove Grade down into the mattress. He tightened his legs around Clay’s hips, his feet braced against long clenched thighs, and let go of his grip on Clay’s shoulder so he could reach down and grab his cock.
Clay made a disapproving sound, but he could sod off. His cock was getting enough attention as Grade’s ass clenched and clutched at it.
“God,” Grade muttered as he dragged his hand roughly along his cock in jerky, impatient strokes. His hand was slick with come and leftover lube. He could feel the knot of tension in his stomach and thighs pulse in time with each stroke/thrust until it was squeezed down into the cradle of his hips—a hot ache of need that throbbed in time with the soft, rough grunts from Clay’s throat.
He was so close. All he needed was a bit… more.
Clay pushed himself up onto his knees and grabbed Grade’s hips in both hands, his thumbs hooked over the knob of bone. It left Grade arched helpless back over the bed, his weight braced on his shoulder blades as Clay slammed into him with quick, rough thrusts. Grade lost hold of his cock as his brain tried to ride the swell of pleasure that pushed at him. He twisted his hands into the sheets, cotton bunched between his fingers as he teetered on the edge.
He’d wanted to be fucked, and he’d gotten his wish. Sweat slid under his ass as Clay dragged him up onto his thighs, fingers tight enough to bruise, and came with a shudder and a hot, wet spill inside Grade. The slick feeling inside him made Grade gasp and tighten his legs around the other man, his heels pressed against his ass.
Clay pulled out abruptly and shoved Grade back down onto the bed. He laid a forearm over his stomach to pin him in place and sprawled out, shoulders nudged between his thighs and mouth warm and wet as he wrapped it around Grade’s cock.
This time it was Grade who choked out a “hell” as he reached down to tangle his fingers in Clay’s hair. He pressed his head back into the pillows as Clay sucked, wet and lewd, at him, his tongue slick and firm against the underside of Grade’s cock.
Pleasure backlashed through Grade like a whip as he came, muscles trembling and nerve endings on fire. He came like it was wrung out of him and then sprawled out boneless on the bed, waiting for the sweat to dry.
Clay lay across Grade’s legs for a moment, his chin braced on Grade’s thigh. It felt… easy. Without any real thought behind it, Grade reached out and brushed Clay’s hair back from his face, fingers tangled through the messy curls. Clay leaned into the touch like a cat, eyes closed and body relaxed.
Then a cellphone rang. Clay opened his eyes with a brief flicker of something like regret and rolled off the bed. The scars on the curve of his ass pulled taut, white and raised, as he strode over and grabbed the phone and cigarette packet up from the dresser in one hand.
“Still bad for you,” Grade said. “For the record.”
Clay ignored that. He checked who was calling as he headed for the balcony.
“I need to get this,” he said. “Make yourself decent. Use the shower if you want.”
He didn’t even look back at Grade.
Now all that felt easy was Grade… and not in a good way.
Grade kicked the tangled sheets off his feet and lay there for a moment. He had never been much good at pouting, though. It made him want to get up anddosomething. Besides, it wasn’t like there was any reason to pretend it was more than what it was: stress relief.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed and went to gather his clothes up off the floor. When he picked his jeans up, the weight of them caught him by surprise for a second, and then his phone fell out of the pocket with a hard crack as it hit the wooden floor.
“Shit,” he muttered as he grabbed it to check for cracks.
He ran his thumb down the screen, and it flickered to life. There were a dozen messages, all in the last half hour. He didn’t recognize the number.
Grade swiped to unlock the phone. Photos. Of Dory, with a split lip and a furious look on her face, up against a metal wall.
The final message was just an address and the instruction totell no one.
Something opened up inside Grade and took everything. All that was left was the hollow rush of panic and the thin, unconvincing reminder that—
I promised her.
Grade swallowed hard, his mouth dry and sour, and then walked over to the balcony. Clay held up a finger to beg another second on the call, then frowned as he took a good look at Grade.
