6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

PISTON

I wish I was surprised to wake up with my dick hard enough to be used as a weapon, but despite me taking an ice-cold shower that made my fingers and toes completely numb and then jerking off twice as quietly as possible, I still passed out with thoughts of Milo's lips stuck on a loop in my head.

I groan quietly, shoving my hand under the covers and into my shorts.

"I have to fucking let this go," I mutter to myself, wrapping my cock in a tight grip and giving myself punishingly hard strokes. I lick my lips, imagining the sweetness of Milo still lingering there.

I barely even had a taste of him. That has to be why I'm so stuck on this, right? I jerk myself faster, reluctantly giving in to the flashbulb fantasies of what might have happened if we had taken things further that night.

Milo's pristine, unmarked bare skin fully on display for me, his body bowed with pleasure and his cock hard and dripping.

Our hands and mouths devouring each other greedily. Beautiful gasps and desperate moans falling from his lips as I tug his pebbled nipples between my teeth while I grind my cock against his.

I can practically taste the salty tang of his sweat as I imagine flipping him over and licking down his spine until I bury my face between his ass cheeks and eat his hole like it's my last meal.

Guilt dances around the edges of my consciousness, but I'm too far gone to acknowledge it just yet. I stuff my free hand into my mouth, biting down hard on my knuckle as my toes curl and my balls tighten. I choke back a groan, turning it into a muffled grunt as my cock starts to pulse in my grip, painting my stomach with stripes of sticky release.

I huff and pant, loosening my hold on my tingling, sensitive cock and screwing my eyes closed tighter as if that will banish the fantasy of Milo licking the cum off of my abs with a filthy grin on his lips.

"This is so fucking wrong," I murmur hoarsely, wiping my hand on my sheets before dragging both of them over my face.

The heat inside of me doesn't fade, instead it shifts from lust to boiling shame as Milo's face is replaced by the image of a scowling, pissed off Hero. If my cock weren't already shriveling, that would definitely do it.

"Piston?" Milo's voice is accompanied by a light rap at my bedroom door.

My pulse skyrockets again and I scramble to pull my sheets up to cover the mess I made.

"I'll be out in a minute," I call, hoping my voice doesn't sound as strangled and rough to him as it does in my ears.

"Oh, okay." I hear the shuffling of his bare feet for a second as they fade back down the hallway.

"Jesus." I pinch the bridge of my nose then use my sheets to mop up my stomach.

Once I'm reasonably clean, I grab a t-shirt out of my dresser and tug it over my head on my way out of my bedroom. The fresh smell of bourbon pecan coffee fills the house, along with the loud, poppy dance beats of some artist I'm positive Jag would love. I follow the sound into the kitchen and stop in the doorway.

The sight that greets me is Milo's ass sticking out of my refrigerator, shimmying back and forth to the music. I don't care if I'm not religious, I'm definitely leaning towards my Satan theory. There's no other explanation for Milo's existence other than to tempt me into committing the ultimate sin against one of my best friends, and by extension my motorcycle club and business.

"I hate to tell you this, but your refrigerator has to have some kind of black hole vortex in it," he says, straightening up and turning to look at me over his shoulder.

"What?" I laugh.

"I swear on my life, there was a carton of eggs in here. Sorry I bothered you, but I was coming to ask where you keep your pans because I checked every damn cupboard in this kitchen and couldn't find a pan to save my life. And then when I came back in here to at least start preparing the eggs in the meantime, they're missing, vanished. Some dude should start a seven-part podcast serial because there is no trace."

I choke back another laugh.

"You mean those eggs?" I point at the counter right next to the coffee machine.

He whips around and snorts. "Well, that was less exciting than my theory that someone broke in and stole them while I was standing outside of your bedroom not listening to you jerk off."

Blood rushes to my face. "I wasn't…" I sputter, unable to even finish the lie when he arches an eyebrow and pins me with a knowing smirk.

"Sure," he says sagely. "You were probably doing sit ups in bed, right? That explains all the creaking and grunting."

He drags his eyes over me with a hungry expression. Knowing he had his ear pressed up against the other side of the door while I got off thinking about him makes my dick hard all over again.

"Keep this up and I'm going to end up with hypothermia from all the cold showers I'm going to have to take." I stride over and open the narrow cupboard right next to the stove to pull out a pan like he asked for.

"Son of a bitch. I didn't even see that cupboard there."

I grin and shake my head.

"Get some coffee and go sit down, I'll make breakfast."

He grabs a couple of mugs out of the cupboard right above the coffee maker and pours coffee into both of them, pushing one over so it's right next to the stove for me. He doesn't go sit down though, instead he hops up to sit on the counter, swinging his legs and bopping his head to the beat of the new song that's now playing from his phone.

"I should probably start by finding a job," Milo says, as if we were already in the middle of a conversation. "The motel is gross, but it's cheap enough that I can afford to stay there for a month or so while I save up for a security deposit on a new place."

"Any particular field?" I ask, mentally running through a list of places in town that might be hiring.

He takes a sip of his coffee and shrugs while I crack eggs into the pan and whisk them. He stops swinging his legs and a hint of embarrassment flickers in his eyes.

"I don't have a degree or anything," he says. "I have experience in a bit of everything. Retail, restaurant—both as kitchen staff and server, bee keeping, personal assistant, construction, one summer digging graves…" He ticks things off on his fingers as he rattles off the list.

"I'm sorry… grave digging?"

"It was good money. Once they found out I didn't actually have the right certification to be operating the backhoe, I got fired though. Which I get, but is also bullshit because I obviously knew what I was doing, and they didn't even give me the chance to get the certification before they fired me." He rolls his eyes.

"If you knew what you were doing, why didn't you just get the certification before they found out?"

"I meant to, I just kept forgetting to enroll in the stupid class." He waves his hand dismissively. "Anyway, my point is, I'm not picky about a job as long as the pay isn't abysmal."

"And as long as you don't have to take a class to get certified first," I say dryly.

"Ideally." He smirks.

"I know plenty of people around Fall Crosse, let me put out some feelers and see what I can find for you."

"Shit, no, I didn't mean that I needed your help. I was just thinking out loud. When I have a whole list of shit I have to get done, saying it out loud helps me keep my thoughts from spiraling too much." He shakes his head and sets his mug next to him on the counter. "I'm sure that's what Hero thinks too, that I showed up to ask for money or something."

I want to assure him that's not the case, but the speculation yesterday at the shop after he left was pretty much exactly that.

"I don't think he knows what to think," I say.

"That's fair." Milo chews on his bottom lip and starts swinging his legs again.

"I really don't mind though. I'd do the same for any of my friends." That part isn't even a lie. Hell, I'd do the same for a perfect stranger if they asked nicely enough.

"Is that what we are? Friends?" There's a hint of teasing in his voice that makes me want to drag him close and lick my way into his mouth.

I grunt noncommittally and jerk my head towards the cupboard where I keep the plates.

"These eggs are just about ready."

Milo hops down and I pull the pan off the burner, my mind still busy making a list of people to call this morning about possible jobs. At least this is something to focus on that Hero would thank me for.

After breakfast I'll take him back to the motel, I'll help find him a job, and then as long as I can keep enough distance between us, I'm sure this attraction will eventually settle to a manageable level. I just need to keep reminding myself that he's off limits, and sooner or later, my dick will get the memo.

I hope.

MILO

After Piston dropped me back off at the motel, I got another new room key and swore up and down to the guy behind the desk that I wouldn't forget this one. He didn't look like he believed me, which is smart because there's at least a fifty percent chance that I'm going to be back tomorrow for another key. Then I took a shower, jerked off three times remembering the muffled sounds I heard coming from Piston's bedroom this morning—was he thinking about me when he got himself off? Ungh fuck, I hope so. Maybe a fourth jerk session is in order—and texted Hero to make sure he still wanted me to stop by for lunch.

HERO: Yeah, swing by whenever! I know it's still a little early, but my morning appointment canceled, so I'm just fucking around at the shop until my two o'clock shows.

I send a thumbs-up in response and then continue rifling through my clothes in search of something reasonably clean. I guess I should add ‘find a nearby laundromat' to my growing to-do list. Ugh, having too many things to do makes me sleepy.

Look for a job? Cool, something to keep me occupied.

Look for a job, text my mom to update her, find somewhere to do my laundry, jerk off thinking about Piston a dozen more times, and order an Uber to take me to Ink Slingers? It takes all of my mental strength not to reach for the remote and crawl back under the covers to spend the afternoon binge-watching shitty daytime TV.

This time, I check my pockets three times to make sure I have my wallet, phone, and room key before I leave the motel and hop in the back of the Uber. It's a short ride to Ink Slingers. Everything feels like it's a short ride in Fall Crosse. It's kind of nice. My mom and I moved around a ton, but it was almost always bigger cities. There's something cozy about a smaller town like this. Especially a smaller town that surprisingly has Pride flags displayed in the window of nearly every business we pass.

My stomach flutters with nerves when the driver drops me off. The car pulls away and I linger on the sidewalk for a minute, gathering my courage. This isn't anywhere near as scary as yesterday was. Today, he already knows I'm his son and he wants me here.

Sure, he does now, because he has no clue what a fuckup and a mess you are .

I grimace at that bitchy inner voice of mine and shake my head to clear it.

"You can do this," I murmur to myself, pushing myself forward before I can give in to the impulse to stay rooted here on the sidewalk all afternoon.

A wall of sound hits me as I push the door open. Some guitar-heavy nineties song is playing loudly through the overhead speakers and there are several conversations going on all at once in addition to the buzz of multiple tattoo machines. It's enough to make me dizzy, but the way half a dozen pairs of eyes turn my way all at once is distracting enough that the noise all fades into the background.

I give an awkward laugh and shove my hands into my pockets.

"Sorry, Milo, I had a walk-in for some quick flash right after we texted, but I'll be done in just a few minutes," Hero calls over to me. He pulls his needle back from the arm of the guy he's working on. "Feel free to hang out though. I didn't get the chance for proper introductions yesterday, so, that's Arrow, Piston, Tex, Brick, and Jag." He points to the guys one by one as he names them.

Piston doesn't look up from the woman he's working on, but I can see the back of his neck flush when Hero introduces him.

"Hey there, Puppy." The twink in a mesh tank top, Jag, flashes me a smile.

"I'm sorry?" I drift a little closer, sure I misheard him.

"Puppy," he repeats. "Hero's the big dog, which makes you Puppy."

I scrunch my eyebrows together. "Uh, I didn't know I was getting a nickname. Is there any kind of appeals process?"

The other blond twink shoots me a sympathetic smile from his place leaning against the wall. He's far more clean cut than the rest of the guys in the shop, without any visible ink, just a baby pink hoop through his septum.

"Unfortunately there's not," he says. "But if you'd rather be ‘Brick,' I'll trade you."

I waffle my head back and forth, considering the offer.

"Hey, no tradesies," Jag insists.

I open my mouth to argue but Tex, the guy at the next station over with a cowboy hat perched on his head, just shakes his head. "Arguing with Jag is like trying to reason with the ass end of a bull. Better to save yourself the trouble."

I sputter a laugh at that imagery.

"Welcome to the madhouse." Arrow gives me a friendly smile. "You get used to it."

My chest warms at the implication that he expects I'll be around to get used to it. Sure, I'm Hero's son, but they don't even know me. I swallow hard and nod with a smile.

"Thanks."

"So, you're sticking around for a while then?" Tex asks.

"Yeah, I'm staying at the motel for now, but looking for a job is the first thing on my list. I kind of uprooted everything to follow this whim, so I'm here until I have a good reason not to be."

"The motel?" Hero repeats, frowning like he didn't stop by to talk to me there yesterday . Maybe it didn't really click in his head until now. That would be totally relatable. Sometimes it takes me anywhere from one to seven business days to process shit, so I get it.

I nod. "Yeah, it's not so bad. I can afford to stay there for another month with what I've got in savings. I figure that should be enough time to find a job."

He grunts and lifts his needle off of the guy's skin again to look around the shop with a furrow in his brow and a frown on his lips.

"That place is a rat-infested dump," he mutters.

"It's really not that bad. I haven't seen any rats at all. Maybe, like, one cockroach, but…"

Hero huffs through his nose. "Oh, hell no."

Jag shudders then gives an exaggerated gag. "Fucking bugs, man."

"Scared of one itty bitty roach, Jag?" Tex teases.

"Fuck you. Find one in your bed and we'll see how itty bitty you think it is."

"Piston," Hero barks over Jag and Tex's back and forth.

I feel like my dad saying his name is all the permission I need to look at Piston again. His shoulders tense and, after a second, he looks up from his work.

"All motels have roaches," Piston says reasonably.

"Are you kidding right now?" Hero grumbles.

Piston swivels in his chair and I hold my breath, even though I'm not quite sure why.

"I'm not the only one with a spare room," he argues.

Hero raises an eyebrow. "Arrow and Lewis just moved in together and they're still in their ‘fucking all over the house' phase." Arrow nods in silent agreement. "Jag's house is one more piece of scrap metal away from being declared a hoarder situation, and Tex and I both have one-bedrooms."

The two of them have a silent staring contest that feels like it lasts for a century while my heart hammers and I fidget nervously with a loose string inside my pocket.

"Please?" my dad says more gently.

Piston's shoulders sag. It's obvious who won the standoff. He clears his throat and his jaw ticks as he sets it with resolve.

"Yeah, of course he can stay in my spare room as long as he needs. Your family is my family." That last part sounds almost like he's reminding himself.

I ping-pong my eyes back and forth between them, quickly catching up with what's happening.

"I really don't need—" I start to argue, even though Piston's spare bedroom sounds a hell of a lot more appealing than the motel for the next month.

"I missed out on twenty-eight years of being an overprotective dad. Indulge me?"

A warm feeling swells in my chest and clogs up my throat. I nod.

"Yeah. Thanks." I risk another glance at Piston, hoping no one else can tell how hard I'm trying not to jump up and down at this unexpected turn of events.

He meets my gaze and my skin heats under his attention.

Living under the same roof as Piston? Sharing a shower and having breakfast together every morning? Having unlimited opportunities to convince him I'm a fully-fledged adult, perfectly capable of deciding for myself who I sleep with?

Well, if Dad insists…