Page 90 of Isaac

Our tongues meet in a fiery, wet dance and when he pulls back a moment later we are both breathless again.

"I don’t know if I can go again," I tell him honestly as he rubs himself against me. Everything I had he fucking milked it out of my dick. "Later."

"I can’t go again yet either," he admits. "I just can’t seem to stay away." Slowly he sags back on the bed and together we stare at the ceiling and it’s the most peaceful I’ve been in years.

"In prison," I begin, my voice a low, raw whisper, clawing its way out from under my tongue, "I wasn’t always someone who mattered. I’m sure by now you heard I was a made man in prison. Ran my business from there for years. But when I went in, I was barely eighteen. A legal adult by the time the judge finally read my sentencing. Wasn’t going to juvie anymore. And Thoreau…believe it or not…but we have a lot of enemies. Some of them we put behind bars for the good of ours and everyone else's business in this city." I pause. There’s a knot in my throat and I swallow to dislodge it. "Imagine their enjoymentwhen Jacob’s son finally arrived. Plus Jacob was dead. No one to threaten them. And Maurice was… well, has always been a coward. I think he was hoping he’d quietly get rid of me that way. I had no protection. No friends. Nothing."

"Jesus fuck, Isaac..." Hawk's voice has that tremor in it that I’m very much familiar with. It’s when you need to sound firm but on the inside, you’re fuming. Only I hide it a little better. He needs more practice. But then again, he didn’t spend several years in the lock-up playing punching bag for the nasty fuckers, whose dicks I wish to cut off even now that most of them are in the ground. I put them there.

"Listen, I don't want your pity," I snap, my defenses rising.

"It’s not—"

"It is and we both know it and if you continue feeling that way, then today is one and done."

"I’m sorry."

"Don’t need your fucking apologies either." I push off the bed, riled up. I know I shouldn’t be. I brought this shit up. What did I really expect?

Hawk rises up with me, hands reaching out to cradle my face.

I swat them away. "Go to hell, Cody!"

It’s probably the first time I say his real—his legal—name when we’re this intimately close, and he freezes for a moment like I just struck him. Something shifts in his expression, like things clicking into place. I don’t know what to make out of his reaction. He’s just as much of an enigma as I like to be to the outside world.

"I think we’re having communication issues," he huffs out, sliding his palm down my thigh as if trying to ground us both with that single contact.

"No shit." The sarcasm tastes bitter on my tongue.

"I’m sorry if I said something to upset you."

"Oh, for fuck’s sake." Swinging my legs over the edge of the bed, I create distance between him and me, a quiet protest against his dumb emotions and his incessant need for apologies. Goddamn pussy.

He presses himself to my back, his mouth near my ear and I don’t like the position I’m in. The position of a certified dickhead.

In retaliation, I spin around swiftly—all harsh movements and raw energy— forcing him down onto the cool sheets below us as I straddle him again. Our cocks brush against each other, speaking louder than any conversation or argument ever could–igniting sparks that surge through every nerve ending of our entwined bodies.

And then I forget why I was so riled up in the first place.

I crack my eyes open and determine that it’s late by the length of the delicate patterns the sun has painted on the walls. For a brief moment, I feel disoriented and lazy and I allow myself to bask in the unfamiliar comfort of waking up beside someone. Beside Hawk.

He’s out cold and blissfully naked and I take a second to appreciate his body, the hard lines of it, the lean muscles, the silky hair splayed on the pillow around his head like a dark halo, the glint of the metal piercing his left ear, the ink on his skin, the scars left by war that makes no sense.

He did most of the work during the later portion of the night, milking my cock dry until I couldn’t remember my own name.

His arm is thrown over my chest and I remove it carefully, trying not to wake him up.

I’ve gotten just a couple of hours of sleep and I should be exhausted. My body should be rebelling against any kind of physical activity but I feel more alive than I have in years.

Another anomaly I can’t explain when it comes to Hawk.

And frankly, I’ve reached the point where I’m not questioning it anymore. Maybe, just maybe the universe has finally decided to give me someone. To give me that one person who will make everything better. Worth it.

But reality has a way of intruding, even in the most idyllic moments. With a sigh, I reluctantly rise up from the bed and pad downstairs. The house is quiet and still, as if holding its breath and waiting for something to shatter the peace.

The first thing I do is look for my phone. It was a mistake to leave it abandoned here on the couch. I don’t even remember how it made it there. I must have tossed it away when Hawk and I were about to get busy.

The device is blinking insistently with a dozen missed calls from Jeremy.

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