Crossing Borders (7 page)

“So good,” Tristan whispered between kisses, not even aware that he'd spoken until the words were out. “You're…so hot.”

Michael moved from Tristan's lips, finding and licking the junction between neck and shoulder. Tristan dropped his head back to give him more skin, but miscalculated, and his head smacked back on the cabinets.

“Jeez, baby, looks like you need to wear that helmet inside too,” murmured Michael against his skin. Michael moved back, and Tristan made a noise when he lost contact. Michael smiled. “Back soon,” he said and went to stir the sugar syrup into the bowl of lemon juice Tristan had made earlier. He added the raspberries to the lemonade, poured the mixture into a pitcher, then placed it in the fridge. “It'll be a while before this cools to a nice drinking temperature.”

“Yeah?” Tristan was still dazed.

“Yeah, a little while.” He took a ribbon of Tristan's long red hair in his hand. “This is like fire,” he said. “Red hair is often curly, but yours is like silk.”

“Mmmhmm,” said Tristan, being stroked and loving it, like a cat.

“You are so beautiful. I thought that the first time I ever saw you.” Michael kissed him, hard, still holding his hair, winding it in his fist.

“Yeah?” Tristan liked the small tug, liked Michael's possession of him.

“Wanted you,” said Michael.

“Me?” Tristan kissed him back, loving the taste of him, loving how his beard was scratchy, and his skin was tough from shaving.

“Started calling you Sparky because when I ticketed you that first time, I looked into your eyes, and this shock went straight to my balls,” Michael said into his hair.

“No kidding, really?” Tristan wanted more skin, so he started to unbutton Michael's Hawaiian shirt. Under his assault, Michael's shirt opened in seconds. He stopped what he was doing and just gazed at Michael, his hands over his mouth.

“Sparky?”

“You are so…” Tristan stood back to look. “Oh.” He couldn't stop himself; he went straight for one brown nipple encircled by blond hair sort of just calling him and wrapped his lips around it. He licked it, working it with the bead on his tongue, feeling it harden under his probing. He rubbed his face in the fuzz on Michael's chest, the crinkliness of it going straight to his cock, before taking over the other nipple.

“Oh, hey.” Michael cupped the back of his head. “You…hey.”

“Yeah, oh, this is good,” he said against Michael's chest, his brain melting from the sensual stimulation. He tried to sink into Michael then, his face rubbing the tan flesh, his hands tracing the muscles. “I wish I could tell you how this makes me feel.”

“Yeah.”

Tristan moved like a blind man reaching out, wanting everything. He was trying to crawl inside Michael and feel him from the outside at the same time. Tristan's hands shook as they explored.

“It's been a while for me,” Michael murmured.

“What can I…what should I do?” Tristan was at a loss.

“Oh.” Michael cupped Tristan's face in a tender gesture. “I'm trying to think if I was ever that young.”

“Hey.” Tristan pulled back, stung. He might not know how to
ask
for what he wanted, but he for damn sure knew what he wanted. He caught Michael around the neck and pulled him in for a full-body embrace and a searing kiss that he was sure left little doubt that, though he might be young, he was not to be dismissed casually.

Michael took Tristan's shoulders in his hands and forced him back.

“What?” asked Tristan, bewildered. “No good?”

“Are you kidding?” said Michael. “I feel like a junior high school kid; I'm about to come in my pants.”

Tristan's face burned. “I…well, me too.” He laid his hands on Michael's chest, sliding them up to his shoulders, reaching out to bring Michael back. Tristan pulled Michael hard against the whole length of his body again and surged against him. “Do you have a load of laundry you need to do? Because I'm like, so close if I touch my fly button I'll go off.”

“Sparky,” Michael panted, his hips snapping against Tristan's in a powerful thrust as he forced the younger man against the counter, lining up their cocks through the fabric of their pants, using the zipper to scratch him a little. “The things you say sometimes make me think…”

Tristan came so fast his hips jerked, and he shook and slammed against Michael, who held him close and followed him over the edge. Their mouths joined then, in passionate combat, their lips fused and their tongues searching until their hearts slowed down a little. Michael gently lifted Tristan up onto the counter and held him.

Tristan wrapped his arms and legs around Michael and put his head down, his teeth grazing the space where Michael's neck met his strong shoulder. “So good,” said Tristan with a sigh, clinging to him like a monkey “I want more… I want everything.”

For an answer, Michael just rubbed his face in Tristan's hair. “Chased you lots, Sparky,” he murmured into the stuff, marking the skin of Tristan's neck.

“Caught me,” repeated Tristan, moaning softly at the burn and sting of the blood Michael was bringing to the surface of his delicate skin.

“Would you like to take a bath?” Michael asked. “I have a big tub.”

“Are you planning to take it with me?” Tristan jumped down from the counter. He started across the kitchen to the hall door and turned to find Michael staring at him with hot eyes. “What?”

“You are so beautiful, Sparky,” Michael said, pushing away from the counter to follow him.

Tristan dipped his head so his long hair would hide his face. “You make me feel beautiful.” He allowed Michael to pass him and watched the way his body moved as he led him to the only bathroom in the small house, situated between the two bedrooms.

Michael's footfalls were silent, catlike on the hardwood floors compared to Tristan's, and Tristan had an idea that he did everything in that same measured, deliberate, and conscious way. He wondered if Michael brought dates home often, and if he did, were they more like him? Were they older, more sedate, more grounded and less likely to do something as stupid as humping him like a puppy while he tried to make lemonade? By the time Tristan heard Michael turn on the water, his face was on fire.

“What's up?” asked Michael.

“Nothing really,” said Tristan, looking around what seemed to him a relatively large bathroom. Like every other part of the house, this room was beautiful, spare, and presumably carefully remodeled. The focal point was an enormous claw-foot bathtub, slipper shaped, with a high back. It impacted the eye, thought Tristan, the graceful, essentially fluid shape of the tub against a geometric backdrop of gray and cream tiles. It was exactly the kind of bathroom that Tristan pictured for mystery novels and trendy bed and breakfasts. It was a monochromatic man's room with no place for extra paper, or his sister's endless zippy bags for cosmetics.

Michael slipped his shirt off and looked straight at Tristan while he removed his sticky jeans and shorts. “That's a feeling I wasn't nostalgic about.”

“It's not an everyday occurrence for me, either.” Tristan looked at Michael, whose body was fit and tanned and ripped. Michael had lied—the man had abs to die for. “I think if I hang out with you much I'd better get used to it,” he said thickly.

Michael turned a slightly pink shade at that revelation and came over to help Tristan out of his clothes. He kissed all the skin he found as he revealed it, peeling off Tristan's shirt and undoing the belt on his jeans. When they were both naked, they stood and stared at each other for a long time. Michael broke the connection first by turning away and picking a stick lighter off a shelf to light candles. He dimmed the overhead lights until the room was lit by only the candles' glow.

The tub was pure luxury, all white porcelain and surrounded by a silky white fabric shower curtain that Michael pushed out of the way as he sank in first, his back against the raised lip of the tub. He looked…so hot. Tristan was still, and Michael watched him quietly.

“I, uh, guess I should…” said Tristan, slipping into the water without a splash. He sat at the foot of the tub, facing Michael, and squeezed himself over to the side of the faucet. Tristan looked anywhere but at Michael's eyes, which he knew would be amused at his expense.

“Oh, no, you don't,” said Michael softly. “I get to hold you; it's my tub, my rules.”

“Oh, okay.” Tristan practically swam through the water to sit with his back to Michael's chest. He felt the man inhale and exhale, his own chest rising and falling with Michael's. “This is nice.”

Michael picked up a tiny bottle and poured a little of its contents into the water, swishing it around. The smell of something vaguely familiar teased at Tristan, and he closed his eyes, trying to place it.

“A little aromatherapy,” said Michael. “Nice after a long day of arguing with unrepentant criminals.”

“Christmas…” said Tristan. “It smells like Christmas.”

“Yeah, I guess. It's probably the rosemary; it has an evergreen smell. It kind of reminds me of food,” said Michael. “But then again, so does everything. I'm kind of a foodie.”

“I got that when you made sugar syrup for the lemonade,” said Tristan. “FYI, even mothers don't do that anymore.”

“My mother does,” said Michael.

“Figures.” Tristan ran his hand through the water a little, moving it in ripples. Michael's arm came around him then, stroking the taut muscles on his stomach, slipping lower to brush his cock, which responded with shocking enthusiasm.

Tristan could feel Michael smile against his neck. “You respond so instantly.”

Tristan tried to hide his face in his wet hands.

“No, Sparky, it's not a bad thing. I like that. Are you kidding? It's hot.”

“I'm like that with you.” Tristan put his hand over his shoulder to hold Michael's head where it was, next to the skin on his neck. Michael's touch was making him sigh and shake and want things he was afraid to ask for. “Not everyone.”

“There's something I want to ask you.” Michael kept his voice carefully neutral. “Am I even remotely someone you could see yourself with? Dating, I mean? Not just a trick from Borders because you were curious, but someone real to be with. I don't mind being, you know, just the guy you caught on your very first fishing expedition.”

“Oh, no!” said Tristan. “That feels, like, a million dumb ideas ago.” He stroked Michael's hair thoughtfully, glad his back was turned so he didn't have to have look him in the eyes. He didn't even stop to wonder why that seemed so much more intimate than bathing with the man. “I think you may have saved me from, at best, an embarrassing afternoon.”