Page 44 of Everything's Better With You
“You know that doesn’t matter to me, right?” Joe asked him, his finger tracing Les’s waistband. “We could just kiss all night and that’s all I’d care about.”
Leslie smiled. “You’ve always been so understanding. I remember when I told you, after I retired, that my testosterone levels were low and you knew exactly what to say to make me feel better. You always do.”
Joe ran his fingers lightly over the fly of Les’s jeans and Les shuddered, pressing his face into Joe’s neck.
“Seems like you’re in a can-do mood tonight,” Joe teased, his fingers more insistent as they stroked him over his jeans.
“But I…I wanted it to be,” he gasped. “Right…when we finally got to do this.”
Joe held Les’s face in his hands and made deliberate eye contact.
“Itisperfect because it’sus. It’s perfect because it’s you and me, Leslie, right here, right now, and that’s all that matters to me.”
Joe kissed him and licked at his lips until Les opened for him. Les clung to Joe’s shoulders as Joe unfastened Les’s Carhartt’s and slid his hand inside, gripping Leslie’s very cooperative erection. Joe’s hands were smooth, warm now…so strong and attentive—
“Oh God, Joe, be…God…be careful.”
Leslie moaned as Joe stroked him slowly, insistently, with just enough pressure. Leslie’s legs shook so hard, he was so overwhelmed with the sensation of Joe’s soft hands running over his tender flesh, he…lost…it.
“Oh my God,” he said, pullinghis hips out of Joe’s reach. “I…Joe—”
“Come back here,” Joe said, tugging at Leslie’s hand, which had a death grip on the Bronco’s oh-shit handle. “Come here, Leslie.” Joe wiped his hand on the bottom of his shirt as he pulled him closer.
Leslie let Joe support his shaking body in an embrace and he sighed. “I told you, I wanted it to be perfect—”
“And it is, to me.Youare, to me.” Joe stroked his back and held him close. It wasn’t awkward, it was perfect, just like Joe said it would be.
Leslie laughed softly. “Just more evidence as to how tied up you have me. I’m not too proud to admit it.”
Leslie had never been so open about his body’s failings with anyone else. The sexual experiences he’d had with other men were always a little uncomfortable, and nothing compared to how being touched by Joe had made him feel, and he’d gone and embarrassed himself. His chest burned. He’d wanted this for so long. Would Joe ever want to touch him again? A broken-down middle-aged man?
“I haven’t been with anyone in years, Les. I’d probably be the same.”
“Years?” Leslie’s head jerked up. They’d never talked about exclusivity. How could you ask someone to commit to something when you hadn’t even had a date? There was no saving themselves for each other, no expectations, but he’d assumed Joe had an active sex life. On Leslie’s end there had been a someday hope, but he’d been careful not to push Joe.
“Surprised? Yeah, years. It wasn’t intentional at first, but honestly, Les? The more you and I talked, texted, whatever…that satisfied that need for me. Knowing I could call or text if I wanted to talk, knowing you’d be there with a corny joke or football metaphor was an intimacy I didn’t know I wanted in my life. I had my years of hookups, tried dating a few times, but I never had that kind of a connection with anyone else. You’ve always been here.” He placed Leslie’s hand on Joe’s chest and his other hand he placed on Les’s cheek. “And now you’re here and that’s what matters to me.”
Joe’s smile made Leslie think about the cocky kid he’d met fifteen years ago, the one who’d captivated him and also made him wary. He knew Joe needed to spread his wings and fly, which he’d done to the ends of the earth. The smile on his face now was that of a worldly man who’d gained wisdom and maybe a little heartache along his journey. Itwas honest, open, vulnerable. Leslie wasn’t the only one exposed out here.
“And I’m not done kissing you. Come here.”
Joe pulled him in and Leslie kissed him hard, loving the scrape of Joe’s stubble against his lips. He couldn’t get enough of the contrast between the soft and wet and rough all at the same time. It was intoxicating and he wanted more, his mouth craving those contrasting sensations of hard and soft at once.
He broke away from the kiss and searched Joe’s eyes. He touched Joe’s waist band, fisting the material there. “May I?”
Joe grinned and leaned back against the center console, spreading his legs in invitation. “By all means.”
Leslie’s hands were shaking so bad he couldn’t figure out the clasp of Joe’s black slacks and he worried he would tear something in his fumbling.
“Need assistance?” Joe breathed.
Leslie’s cheeks flushed and he nodded, no longer frustrated with his clumsiness. Joe made it all seem okay.
Joe took his time unzipping his pants while Leslie teetered on the edge of control. He opened his fly and then Leslie pushed his hands out of the way, preferring to seek out Joe’s cock with his own hands, and his mouth.
“Fuck, Leslie,” Joe groaned and tangled his fingers in Leslie’s hair as Leslie found what he was craving and enthusiastically said hello.
Joe slid down further in the seat and Leslie heard Joe’s hands grasping for something, anything to hold onto. His feet lost purchase on the floor and the ledge and he moaned, but Leslie was in his own version of heaven with his nose pressed against Joe’s pelvis, breathing in the scent of his cologne—God, the cologne Leslie had bought for him—mixed with his natural scent, tasting the salt on his skin as Joe’s hips bucked. Leslie wished they were somewhere he could strip Joe of these layers and be skin to skin with him, but he was strangely beyond caring that they were out in the open, that he was in a very compromising position with a man, something he’d never allowed…
