Page 205 of The Locker Room

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down?”

And he did. He came down fearlessly, but he left himself a lot of

room to get hurt, and Xander had to acknowledge that he was going to

have to learn a little self-preservation or his career was going to be

damned short.

That night, the night after the various games and before the match-

up itself, as they were undressing for bed (a little more sedate and

dignified than the night before, although they were both trembling, just

from seeing the other take off layer by layer of their casual dinner

clothes) Xander asked Chris why he and Chris had never played with

that much fearlessness.

Chris had looked at him, dark eyes sad, but with a twist at his lips

that said he could laugh about this a little, too, and folded his slacks so

they"d hang neatly over the chair by the little desk. “You and me, Xan,

we always had something to lose.”

Xan swallowed. “You can"t ever lose me, you know that?”

Chris shrugged, hooking his thumbs in his boxers and giving a little

shimmy that made his already burgeoning equipment waggle, and made

Xander laugh. “Dude, you"re like, the size of a building!”

Xander grinned full out, and walked, naked, to where his lover

stood, grinning at him, and playing like the boy he might always be. “So

The Locker Room 177

are you when you"re hard! I think we may have a—” He reached down

his hand and squeezed. “Handle on each other.”

Chris smirked, and then his expression darkened, and that pretty

mouth pursed into a little boy"s sadness. “I want to touch you forever,

Xander. You can"t ever lose me either, right?”

Chris"s arms came around his shoulders, and he pressed a kiss

against Xander"s mouth that was more like benediction than it was like

passion. Xander opened his mouth and bent his knees so that their chests

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