The Challenge Read online

  Yeah, Dean liked being on top. Fucking. But he wasn’t averse to giving pleasure, either, and it was always, always better when the other person felt comfortable enough to say what they liked. Or show him. Dean wasn’t above admitting he could be an asshole, but never let it be said he was a selfish lover.

  “Fuck.” Jacob’s fingers tightened in Dean’s hair and his hips pumped. “Fuck, baby, that’s so fucking good.”

  Baby?

  Dean paused at the endearment, his fist sliding up to meet his lips as his mouth came down. Jacob didn’t stop moving, fucking into Dean’s hand and mouth. And after the barest moment, Dean went on. Sex talk didn’t mean anything.

  Then it didn’t matter what Jacob said, because Dean unzipped his own jeans and pulled his cock free. Now came the complicated dance of hands and mouth, stroking and sucking at the same time. He had to catch up–Jacob was already making the low sound in the back of his throat Dean had come to recognize as his prelude to coming.

  “Wait, wait.” Jacob tugged harder on Dean’s hair until Dean looked up.

  It took Dean a second to understand Jacob wanted him to stop. Who the fuck ever wanted him to stop when he was blowing him? Dean looked up, one fist still pumping Jacob’s dick, the other his own. “What?”

  “I just…want…” Jacob licked his lips and swallowed, then cupped Dean’s cheek. “Stand up.”

  Dean did with a quizzical laugh. Two men, pants around their ankles, cocks hard. His laugh slid into a groan when Jacob pulled him by the back of the neck to kiss him. It was a hard kiss, but not punishing. Jacob sucked Dean’s tongue as his hand curled around Dean’s dick.

  “Use your hand on me,” Jacob said as he stroked. “I want to make you come. I want your mouth on mine when you come all over my hand.”

  This was not what Dean had expected but fuck, Jacob was jerking him just right and the kiss went on and on, getting hotter by the second. Nothing to do but stroke Jacob’s cock, too. They fell into mutual rhythm.

  His balls got heavy, his cock impossibly harder. The kiss stuttered and broke as Jacob gasped. Dean didn’t have the breath to gasp. He was going to come….

  Jacob came first. Heat and slickness filled Dean’s palm. Pleasure exploded out of him. He found the breath to groan.

  Panting, Jacob kissed him again. Soft, this time. He still cupped Dean’s cock, but his other hand came up to hold the back of Dean’s neck. Forehead to forehead, he smiled.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey,” Dean said.

  Jacob looked between them. “That was hot.”

  Dean laughed, shaking his head. “It was definitely not what I was expecting when you told me you wanted me to suck you off.”

  Jacob reached behind him to grab up a dish towel, wiping his hands and handing it to Dean. “Baby, I am not what you are expecting.”

  Dean wiped his hands and put himself back in his jeans before stepping back. “Is that so?”

  Jacob licked his forefinger and drew a “one” in the air. “That. Is so.”

  It was a good cue to leave. After all, they’d both already gotten off. Dean’s stomach was rumbling, but dinner was cold and he could pick up something on the way home. He’d already spent last night with this guy. And the morning.

  Jacob looked over his shoulder at the sink and the pot with the now-cold pasta. “This will only take a minute to warm up. You staying?”

  Dean leaned to kiss him, relishing the taste of salt and beer on Jacob’s mouth. “Sure.”

  Late-night conversations. Katie loved them. Darkness and distance provided by the phone made intimacy, and she loved that, too.

  Jimmy was good at late-night talk. Jimmy had a voice like melting butter, all warm and soft and sweet. Rich. It didn’t matter what he was saying, really. He told stories like some men built houses, layer by layer and piece by piece, until Katie realized hours had passed and dawn was breaking.

  He’d make love like that, too.

  Katie wondered if she’d ever find out. She’d met Jimmy weeks ago. He’d flirted with her right away. Asked for her number. He’d actually called, too, something that had surprised her since guys like Jimmy always said they’d call but never did.

  Katie wasn’t sure just how they’d fallen into late-night discussions about old movies, art, books, music. About their favorite colors and foods. All she knew was that she told Jimmy things she hadn’t told any guy in a long time, and nothing she said ever seemed to put him off or be too much. Katie had spilled her guts about a lot of things from her most embarrassing moment to her secret fetish for knitted slippers.

  They had become friends, and that was great, but Katie was beginning to wonder if that’s all it would ever be.

  “You stand in front of three doors,” Jimmy said. “What color are they, what is behind each, and which do you pick?”

  Katie laughed. “Where do you come up with these?”

  “I have a book. Two hundred and seven of the most obscure questions to ask a beautiful woman.”

  At least he’d said she was beautiful. Katie cleared her throat. “Let me think about it. You go first.”

  “That’s not fair. I’ve had time to think about it longer than you have.”

  “Tell me anyway,” Katie told him and settled deeper into the blankets.

  “The doors are red, blue and purple. I pick the blue one.”

  “Why?”

  “Because,” Jimmy said, “blue’s your favorite color and I bet you’re behind it.”

  Heat twisted through her. “And what about the other doors?”

  “I don’t open them,” Jimmy told her, “so I have no idea what’s behind them.”

  “Good answer.”

  “Your turn.”

  Katie couldn’t begin to think about doors and colors and what was behind them. Or rather, she could think, but every door she imagined was glass, each had Jimmy behind it, and no matter how hard she tried, she could open none of them. She sighed.

  “Tell me something else, Jimmy.”

  “Like what?”

  “What’s your favorite poem? Do you have one?”

  Jimmy laughed softly, and Katie imagined the brush of his breath against her neck. “Unless you count Jim Morrison lyrics as a poem, no, I guess I don’t. What’s yours?”

  “I like e.e. cummings. My favorite starts off ‘the boys I mean are not refined.’” Katie thought of the girls who bucked and bite, the boys who shake the mountains when they dance. She recited it to him from memory, and Jimmy was quiet for a moment after that.

  “I never liked poetry,” he said. “I had a…teacher…in school who made me recite lots of poetry. It was a way to…well, it doesn’t matter why. I hated poetry because of that teacher. I never thought I could actually like a poem. But I like that one.”

  She heard him yawn and frowned, safe in knowing he couldn’t see her. She was already making a face in anticipation of him ending the conversation, but her voice was neutral in reply when he told her he had to hang up.

  “Yeah,” Katie said. “It’s late.”

  The invitation was on the tip of her tongue, but she bit it back. She didn’t want to invite him out, not even to the coffee shop where they’d first met. He might say no. Worse, he might stop calling her.

  “Night, Katie. Sleep tight.”

  “You too,” Katie said and clutched the phone tight in her fingers after he’d disconnected before she did, too.

  She was still thinking of that conversation when she got home with Dean in tow.

  “Maybe that’s your problem,” Dean said as he flipped through a magazine she’d left on her coffee table. He tossed it down and looked at her. “What? Maybe he knows too much about you already. Destroyed the mystery.”

  “So then why does he keep calling me?” Katie nudged off one shoe with a sigh and then the other before flopping onto her couch. “Do men often call women late at night just to chat because they long to hear the sound of another voice? I think not.”

  “You’re as