Page 21 of The Fae Menagerie
"Oh, you did." Doyle flashed a grin I'd seen countless times from countless suitors. This time, my stomach did a little flip, startling me so much I looked down to make sure an alien wasn't popping out of my chest cavity.
"You do turn me on, Parker, but I don't have to act on it, especially if it makes you uncomfortable."
"I wouldn't have suggested it if it made me uncomfortable." I sighed, trying to put my weird sense of sex positivity into words."I like making you horny. I feel like I'm helping you with a basic sexual need."
"Filling the spank bank with material." Doyle snorted. "Believe me, I have a lifetime's worth. You don't need to help."
That hurt, and I couldn't explain why, not even to myself. I also couldn't keep the pain from my expression.
"I'm sorry." Doyle pulled me from my chair and led me back to the living room couch. "I'm trying to make this easier, and I keep saying it wrong. I like when you touch my wings. I like it a little too much, even though I tell myself not to feel that way about you. I'm sorry."
"I don't mind," I repeated, hoping this time he would get it. "I want you to feel good. Making you feel good makes me feel good."
He cocked his head at me like a confused puppy. "Fucking you would make me feel good," he mused.
"Not that."
"Sorry. I'm trying to work it out. You like touching me, and you wouldn't mind if I touch myself, but only if I don't touch you. Is that right?"
I hadn't put it together as succinctly in my mind, but, "Yes. That's it."
"You aren't worried you'll have nightmares about me touching myself?"
My face heated. A few nights before the scones arrived, I'd been so restless I couldn't sleep. My cock was rock hard, so I'd taken care of it. When I came, I imagined Doyle stroking himself after I'd treated his wings.
I couldn't tell him that. I didn't dare. He would make me act on my urges, and I couldn't guarantee a repeat performance.
"Parker?"
I shook my head and drew my book up to my chest. The dust jacket scraped against my chin, reminding me of the sectionI wanted to read to him. Then I remembered the poor sexual innuendo in the passage and kept it to myself. Maybe I would read it to him tomorrow, when sex was further from our minds.
"Are you still hungry?" Doyle asked. "I'll see if we have any snacks in the pantry."
With Doyle gone, I wandered the opposite direction and stretched out on the living room couch, staring up at the sky. Clouds rolled above us, and it looked like rain to the east, but the air inside the enclosure was always cool and dry.
Here we were, far from the human realm and any semblance of societal norms, and I was still behaving like a schoolboy eager to please his bully. I didn't owe Doyle anything, let alone orgasms. Why did I want to help him get off? Why did it matter if he thought of me when he played with himself? Why now, of all times, did I have an inkling of sexual interest in Doyle?
I couldn't answer any of those questions. I wished Doyle's library contained a selection of books on human sexuality along with the romance. I needed to figure out what was happening inside my head.
"Who keeps sending these damn things?" Doyle shouted through the kitchen doorway. "The kitchen won't make us dinner if it's already here." Then he muttered a soft, "Oh, fuck me."
"What's wrong?" I asked.
"My mother is visiting us tomorrow during our viewing hours. Would you come here, please?"
I marked my page with the opposite side of the dust jacket and met him in the kitchen.
Inside the box, two overstuffed club sandwiches sat side by side, and another scroll sat unrolled beside the box. Unlike the books in the library when they shifted into English, the words on the page stayed abstract and foreign to me.
"Hold your hand over the box."
I did as he instructed.
"Pick up a sandwich."
I did.
"Nothing," he said to himself. "Take a bite?"
