Twenty-two

Twenty-two

Max

Shortly after Jude leaves, I exit the office too. I’m thankful I got all the work done because I think I’m going to have a hard time focusing after that. Seeing Jude so vulnerable and open to me has ruined me for all working days after this. I’m only ever going to want to see him there when I sit at my desk.

I take the long way to the cemetery this time, trying not to feel guilty. I’d known it would happen when I met someone new, but I try to tell myself that he’d want me to be happy. I know that if our roles were reversed, I’d want him to be happy.

I stop for some flowers along the way, and by the time I reach his headstone, the sun is starting to set.

“Hey, Patrick.” I kiss my fingers and place them against the cold marble before kneeling. I brush the old flowers away and place the new ones down. “I’ve missed you.”

Like always, the only answer I get is the warm breeze blowing through the small trees.

“I like him, Patrick.” My voice is just a whisper. It feels like a betrayal just thinking it, and it’s a hundred times worse admitting it. But I also think maybe it’s time. Even if Jude isn’t staying, his being here reminded me what it’s like to be with someone. To have breakfast and joke around and get held while I’m asleep.

I’ve missed it so much. More than I realized.

I stare at Patrick’s name, scripted into the marble. I can’t believe it’s been over two years. It feels like yesterday. And it feels like twenty years.

“I feel bad,” I say softly. “I feel like I should still be mourning you. And I am. So much that it still hurts when I think about it. But it’s not as bad as it was a year ago. Maybe it’s awful of me to already be with someone else. Or maybe it’s long overdue.”

When I don’t get a response, I sigh. “I wish I had someone I could talk to about this. I mean, the guys are all here, but it’s not the same. They knew you and loved you. And I want to talk to you. You always got me on a different level.”

I frown. “That’s kind of sick though, I guess. And selfish.”

The wind blows again, and I put my hand on the headstone. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. You know that I wish more than anything that you could come back. That you’d never left in the first place.”

The breeze settles again, the warmth caressing my skin.

“He’s darker than you were,” I whisper. “Sometimes he gets this look on his face, like he’s remembering something awful. His dad beat him too, like yours did to you. I just want to help him like I was able to help you.”

I hope that’s an okay thing to want. That it doesn’t make me an asshole.

I’d even talk to Rowan about it if I could. But since Jude is his little brother, I have a feeling Jude might not have shared any of this with him. And I don’t want to make things awkward between us. Rowan has become a friend, someone I can count on outside of work as well.

I trace Patrick’s engraved name with my fingertips. I wonder if he can feel how much I still love him. How I wish I had said something meaningful to him the day he died. Right before he walked out the door for work, all I said was, “I’ll see you at dinner.”

Why didn’t I sense that it was the last time I would talk to him? If I loved him more than anything, shouldn’t I have been able to feel something? How much of that was guilt talking? And why did I feel guilty when I hadn’t done anything wrong?

I sigh and lower my hand to my lap. “Don’t hate me for being with someone else, okay? Please?”

Even though I know he won’t give me a response, I still wait for one. My head tells me he loved me and wouldn’t want me to be miserable. But these feelings I have for Jude…they’re so intense. Something I thought I’d never have again, and definitely not so soon.

For so long, I thought I’d have Patrick with me forever. And then he was gone. I’d never felt pain like that. It was like someone had ripped my heart out of my chest, leaving only a gaping wound that would never heal.

But over time, it did. Some days are still harder than others—the holidays he’s not here for, his birthday—but they’re no longer as crushing as they once were. And that’s both good and bad. Because a part of me will always start to feel guilty when I’m not sad about his death. But maybe that’s just part of the healing process.

Something rustles behind me, and I turn to see a man in jeans and a black T-shirt watching me from another grave. He’s turned away from the headstone. I don’t think he’s here to actually see anyone.

I turn back to Patrick’s headstone, but I can’t talk anymore. I feel the guy still watching me, and it makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

“I’ll come back later,” I whisper to Patrick before standing and brushing the knees off my jeans.

“I didn’t mean to intrude,” the guys says before I’ve even taken a step.

I don’t look back at him. “You didn’t.”

“It’s just…you know Jude.”

I pause, my stomach tightening. “Not really.”

“I’m not trying to start anything,” the guy continues, taking a step closer to me. “I was with him for a long time, even though his brothers tried to talk him out of it. And he just up and left one day with no explanation. I just wanted to see him.”

“Well, I’m sorry, but I’m not a middleman. If you want to talk to Jude, then you need to talk to him.”

“I know. I just…” He trails off, and I feel the smallest bit sorry for him. Jude is intoxicating, and if he did up and leave one day with no explanation, that’s pretty shitty. But I also know without a doubt that Jude dated an asshole at some point in his life. And if this guy’s it, I don’t want to spend another second talk to him.

“Can you tell me where he’s staying?” the guy asks.

“No, I don’t know,” I lie. My stomach is starting to knot.

“Really? Because you’ve had sex with him twice in that office of yours.”

A chill runs down my spine. He could just be talking shit, but I don’t think he is. My office does have a window that opens to the alley, but I thought the blinds had been drawn.

The guy laughs a little, almost like he’s embarrassed. “Look, I don’t mean anything by it. Jude’s just…troubled. Always has been. I don’t mean to overstep. He must be staying with you, like how he rooms every other place when he’s on the road. He thinks I don’t know that he’s been fucking his way across the country in exchange for room and board, but I wasn’t born yesterday.”

“That’s enough.” The words are tight and quiet as they rush out of me. I don’t know who this guy is, but his words are twisting my gut. So what if that is how Jude travels? It’s not my business. And it sure as hell isn’t this guy’s either.

The guy holds up his hands. “Look, next time you see him, just do me a favor and tell him Grant’s looking for him, all right?”

I don’t respond, and eventually the guy turns and leaves the cemetery. As soon as he’s gone, I blow out a breath and try to get my trembling hands under control. I don’t know what it was about him, but I do know there’s no way in hell I’m passing that message along to Jude.

***

When Jude shows up at my door at nine, his shoulders are tense. He’s wound up in a way I haven’t seen since the night we fucked in the bathroom of that bar.

“Hey,” I say when he steps inside my apartment, and I close the door after him. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” He rubs the back of his neck before looking up at me. “Would you feel taken advantage of if we fucked without any preamble?”

My lips pull up in a small smile before I can stop them. “I think I can live with that.”

Heat fills his eyes as he grabs my hand and pulls me toward my bedroom. “I want to know what else you have in that side table.”

When we get to my room, I flick the light on and start for the side table.

“No, no,” Jude says. “You sit on the bed. I want to look.”

“Okay.” I do what he says, anticipation building in my stomach.

He shifts stuff around in the drawer until he pulls out a blue dildo, and his lips turn up at the corners. “Glow in the dark? Really?”

“I didn’t buy that,” I reply, my face warming. “A…friend bought that for me like a year ago. That other unopened thing in there is from him too.”

That had been some other guy—Dane—we’d known through Gary. He’d given them to me in an attempt to get me “back in the saddle” after Patrick’s death. I’m still not sure how I feel about that.

Jude pulls up another object still sealed in its packaging. “Ah.” Then he turns to me. “Color on these?”

“Green.” The word is out of me instantly. Then I say, “And I’m going to try really hard to start answering you with words, but I don’t want the spanking thing to stop.”

Jude grins. “I’ll give you whatever you ask for, all right?”

“Okay.”

He palms the dildo before meeting my gaze. “I want you to attach it to the wall in a way that feels comfortable to you.”

I take it from him and waste no time attaching it to the wall. I’ve gotten off plenty with the use of these, so I know where it needs to go without any preamble.

Jude hands me a bottle of lube. “Get it ready for yourself.”

My hands are steady as I spread the lube over the dildo. My dick is rock-hard behind the zipper of my jeans, and I resist the urge to palm myself.

“Out of your clothes.” Jude’s voice is strangled, and I glance over my shoulder to find that he’s already naked. Sweat glistens on his chest, and his dick is standing at attention.

I strip quickly and toss my clothes on the floor.

“On the bed,” Jude orders softly. “Get yourself off just using that. I don’t want you touching yourself at all.”

“I don’t know if I can.” My voice sounds breathless and high.

“If you can, I’ll reward you.” He takes a step forward to cup my face. “I’ll let you use the gag on me.”

My gaze falls to the second unused object. A mouth gag that had an opening instead of the usual ball. Designed to keep someone’s lips open no matter what. After what Jude told me about his ex, I know what it means that he’s offering me that bit of dominance over him.

“Okay,” I reply, my voice barely above a whisper.

Jude releases my face and steps back. “I’m going to watch. Color?”

“Green.”

“Then get to work.”

I don’t need to be told twice. I press my ass back, feeling the dildo sliding into me. It’s harder than Jude, and colder. I push until I’ve bottomed out on it, then pull out and shove myself back again. The headboard smacks into the wall, and it makes Jude grin.

My balls are painfully heavy as I pull off and slam back into it over and over. It’s hard without being able to touch my dick. And I haven’t had someone watching me in a long time.

Jude’s gaze never wavers from me, and he doesn’t touch himself, even as his cock starts to leak precum.

I scoot a little further back, angling my ass to make sure the dildo hits the right spot in me.

“I told you I needed to start making you work for it,” Jude says. His voice is dark, and it shoots a tingle up my spine. If he keeps talking, I might be able to come without touching.

“You were right,” I say, impaling myself again.

“Damn straight I was. Grind against it.”

I do, working my ass in figure eights, feeling the thick toy move around inside me.

“You look so fucking hot,” Jude says. “Go faster.”

I up the pace, slamming back onto the toy over and over, desperation setting in. The need to come is all I can focus on. All I want. My hands shake from how much I want to touch myself, so I grasp the blankets tightly.

“You don’t look like you want it that badly,” Jude says. “I think you can go faster.”

I whimper as I start pounding the toy into me. My heartbeat skyrockets, and my dick is practically begging me for a release.

Jude grips my chin suddenly, forcing me to look up at him. “Come now, Max. Spray your bed and show me what you’ve been saving up for me.”

It’s as if he gripped my cock in his hand with how hard the words hit me. My back bows and I come all over the blankets, panting and close to tears. The feel of it is just so intense. And it’s only heightened by Jude staring into my eyes the entire time it happens.

As I come back down from the high, I register Jude’s hand on me. His arm is wrapped around my shoulders, and he’s squeezing tightly.

“You okay?” he asks, the words somehow making it through the roaring in my ears.

I nod, then say, “Yeah, yeah, I’m good.”

When I shift to sit on the bed, he kneels in front of it, staring up at me with concern in his eyes. “You sure?”

“Yeah.” I take a breath before reaching out and running my thumb over his lips. “Every time I think you can’t make me come any harder, you somehow do.”

He smirks. “That was all you, babe. I barely did anything.”

The term of endearment makes me smile. And I ask softly, “Do I get my reward now?”