Hold fast, p.9
Hold Fast, page 9
“You feel so good, man. So hot. I want to fuck you so fucking badly right now, Zack…”
Yeah, that was good, that was a brilliant plan. Zack stepped away and undid his slacks, shoving them down. “Should I outline the steps for you?”
Isaiah grinned. “Hell yes. What do I do first, Mr. Scherzo? I’m yours to command.”
“Oh god help me.” Zack rearranged his cock in his boxer briefs, breathing slowly. He did not want to come the second Isaiah touched him, which was becoming more and more of an issue. “Take off your pants.”
Of course, then he was looking at a naked Isaiah. He slowed his breaths even more and hoped he wouldn’t embarrass himself.
Zack kicked his own clothes away and sat at the edge of the bed. After a second he spread his legs, which felt lewd and dirty and hot. “On your knees, boy.” Then, hearing the words, his heart stopped. “Oh my god, Isaiah—I didn’t mean—just that you seem to like—”
Instead of words, Isaiah kissed him. “I knew what you meant. You can use ‘boy’ if you want. It’s pretty hot right now.”
“Yeah, no. I can’t. It’ll make me feel like an oppressor. Which I am, because privilege, but it’s really not hot.”
“Then definitely don’t do that.” Isaiah kissed him again. “You want me to take over, Mr. Oppressor?”
He groaned and leaned his eyes into Isaiah’s shoulder. “I just became, like, privileged white cis guy in my head. I don’t deserve pleasure. You should beat me up.”
“Only if you’d like that sort of thing.”
“No.” Zack took a shaky breath. “Way to bring the mood down, right?”
“We can get it back.” Fingers coaxed his face up. “Zack, Zack, Zack. Touch yourself. Get hard for me. Let me watch.”
He obeyed, staring at Isaiah’s eyes even more than the rest of him. Zack leaned back on one arm while the other stroked his cock, pulling his foreskin steadily up and down, getting off on the openness of it, on letting himself be seen.
On letting Isaiah see him.
“Yeah, fuck yeah, harder, get bigger for me, Zack. I can’t fucking wait to taste you.” He reached for his own cock, but Zack shook his head. “I can’t touch?”
“Not until you’re sucking me.”
Isaiah licked his lips. “You want me to come when I’m on my knees?”
“No. Want you to come inside me.”
“Fuck yeah.”
Zack spread his legs even wider. “You really think about this?”
“I wanted to blow you the first time I was in your office, when you thought I was the asshole wasting your time. You have this—this line, in your forehead. I was almost positive I could make it go away if I offered to service you at your desk.”
“Oh god, don’t even…don’t even say that…” No. Sex in his office would be wrong. Obviously. He couldn’t help picturing it, though: his WoJo open, pens to hand, maybe a business podcast on low. He could spread his legs and point to the floor and Isaiah would…
He shook his head. “You jerk. Oh my god.”
Isaiah laughed and dropped to his knees. “I’ll make it up to you.” He clamped his hand over Zack’s, holding it still, and engulfed just the head of Zack’s cock, swirling his tongue, all heat and wet.
Zack was close to shooting immediately.
“Stop, oh god, slow down, you have to slow down or I’ll…” The words ran out as Isaiah started pumping his cock, or using his hand to pump his cock, which should have been clumsy and awkward but instead it was hot, a little bit like being in control, a little bit like being controlled.
Except Isaiah looked right at him, and the sight of his cock in Isaiah’s mouth made his toes curl. No doubt who was in charge, not with that gaze burning into Zack, not with the visual of Isaiah’s arm moving as he stroked himself below the line of the mattress. Yet another tease.
Not that he could look away from Isaiah’s eyes anyway.
“God, you’re so fucking hot.” He wriggled his hand out from under and played with his balls. “I’m really close. I’m sorry I can’t last longer than this.”
Isaiah pulled off and kept pumping. “Foreplay started last night, Tiger. You lasted long enough.”
“You say that like I didn’t take care of myself thinking about this twice since then.”
Isaiah grinned. “Next time maybe you can show me what that looks like.” He ducked his head down and licked around Zack’s fingers, angling for his sac.
“Really—really close now—where—” He had to focus. He bit down on his tongue again. “Where do you want it?”
“My mouth, if you’re negative.”
“I’m negative.”
“Awesome. I want you to come in my mouth, but I want you to see it.”
Zack trembled. “Oh god, that is…” He took himself in hand and straightened up more. “Keep touching yourself. And, uh, open your mouth.”
Hard to imagine how Isaiah managed to keep smiling with his mouth open like that. It had to be something in the way his eyes crinkled, in the way he looked up while Zack jacked his cock with just the right pressure, just the right speed, finally spilling onto Isaiah’s tongue. And oh god, that was his come, right there, and Isaiah was still looking at him, not closing his lips.
It was unbearably hot. The way that Isaiah’s hand hadn’t stopped moving didn’t hurt, either.
He couldn’t stand it. “Oh my god, just fuck me already.”
Isaiah swallowed. “Seriously? Like…right after? I mean, that’s…not uncomfortable for you?”
“Um…” Who asked something like that? Who brings it up?
“Sorry, I’m definitely not against the idea, I’m just not used to guys coming and then wanting me in their ass. Or I’m projecting. I would find that really uncomfortable.”
Questions, or specifically having to answer them, really screwed up Zack’s mood. “It’s actually good for me on that level. Like…that feeling, that it’s almost…” He paused.
Isaiah’s fingers drifted over his thighs. “It’s okay.”
“No, I mean, it’s okay with me. That it’s not comfortable. That it’s a little awkward. That it feels a little like…” He didn’t like the word force.
“I think I get it. Tell me again, Zack. Tell me what you want.”
Zack looked deeply into his eyes. “If you don’t fuck me right now I’m leaving.” He was unprepared for Isaiah to tackle him to the bed.
“You better not. On your back, yeah?”
Yes. “Whatever, I don’t care. I want you inside me.”
“Mmm, I like you desperate, man.”
Zack made as if to roll away, but Isaiah pinned him to the bed.
And yeah, that was better than good. He wrapped his legs around Isaiah’s waist and arched up for another kiss. “I need you. Please.”
Isaiah growled, shifting them up toward the head of the bed. “Fuck yeah. You like a lot of stretching, or—”
“I’m going to kill you.”
It took mere seconds for Isaiah to roll on a condom and push Zack’s legs up so he could press lubed fingers into him.
“Come on, come on, come on, just fucking—”
“Hush, Zachary.”
Zack hushed and held himself open. And oh god, the pressure of Isaiah’s thick, cut dick at his hole. It was exquisite, and it burned, and Zack couldn’t help gasping into the lips suddenly on his.
Yeah, that was too much, and it was perfect, it was exactly what he needed. He savored the yield of his body, hooking one arm around Isaiah’s neck and kissing him harder as he relentlessly drove forward.
“Jesus, you’re so fucking tight…” The hitch in Isaiah’s voice became a sigh as he bottomed out. “Oh fuck, Zack, oh fuck.”
“You feel so big.” Zack used his heels to lift himself, to change the angle, and Isaiah shivered.
You’re not the only one who can take a man apart. Zack tensed his muscles and kept kissing—the side of Isaiah’s face, his neck, his ear. He was sweating, and Zack licked a stripe up his throat, making him moan again.
“I want—I need—” Isaiah brushed Zack’s hair back, staring down at him. “Does harder work for you?”
“Do it.”
Isaiah lowered his head, bracing on the bed with one arm and looping the other under Zack’s shoulder to hold him still. He started slowly, steadily, building it up, pounding harder until both of them were grunting with the effort, meeting in the middle.
It was rough and dirty, the sound of skin slapping skin somehow accentuating the sensation of Isaiah driving into his ass, lips sliding over lips, fingers digging in to shoulders, and Zack wasn’t quite hard again, but he arched up into Isaiah’s body and opened for every thrust.
The desperate noises Isaiah made as he drove deeper were more of a turn-on than anything else. Zack’s entire body pulsed with the rhythm of it, and when Isaiah panted that he was going to come, he was coming, he was coming now, Zack held him tightly as he shuddered through the orgasm.
“Baby, that was…fuck…sorry, but that was…god, Zack…”
Yeah, making Isaiah Carlin speechless was quite the accomplishment. He kissed the man’s forehead and rubbed his back. And, okay, tensed his ass muscles until Isaiah groaned again.
“You keep that up I’m gonna stay right here till I get hard again.”
“Was that supposed to be a threat?”
“Man, that was…fuck.” Isaiah pulled out, tossed the condom, and loomed over him, on hand planted on his chest. “Hey. So I’m glad that worked out.”
Zack giggled. “Are you going to review it on Yelp?”
“I just might. ‘Sex with Zack Scherzo. I found this encounter to be arousing and inspiring, and I hope to come again in the near future. So to speak.’”
“Oh, is that right?” He tumbled Isaiah to his back and knelt over his chest. “How near?”
“Give a man a few minutes.”
“I believe ‘a few’ is defined as three.” Zack started stroking his semi-hard cock. “You don’t mind if I get started on round two without you, right?”
“I could do this all night.” Isaiah grinned up at him. “I hope you blocked off enough time for me.”
“I hope you’re worth it. I could be studying right now.”
“Burn.”
But it wasn’t, and both of them knew it.
Zack impulsively leaned down for a kiss. “Thanks for inviting me over tonight.”
“Yeah, I’m a genius.”
Teasing Isaiah turned into making out with Isaiah, and later—much later—Zack made his way to his car, feeling sore in a few places, and residual twinges of arousal in a few others. The wind had picked up and felt almost abrasive on the sensitized skin of his neck and cheeks and lips.
They barely knew each other. They were busy men. Neither of them were quite ready for the kind of relationship that led to permanence, even though both of them wanted that eventually.
But if Zack found someone else who made him feel this fucking alive after a single night of sex, he’d be shocked. His whole body sang with the hotness of Isaiah’s attention, and with the surprising sweetness of it, too.
He fell asleep thinking about the brush of Isaiah’s lips across his stomach, and the intensity of those brown eyes looking up at him.
Chapter Eleven
Four days after seducing Zack/being seduced by Zack, Isaiah could think of little else.
He sat in his studio and tapped the edge of his keyboard, which did not magically make words appear on the current business plan he was playing with. Did he even really want to do instructional sessions about video editing? Probably not enough to make it worth the trouble of recording them.
And he didn’t want to market them, either. He closed the document and sat there staring at his desktop background, which was a desert landscape.
Had Zack ever been to the desert? Would he like it? Why was Isaiah trying to plan a trip to the desert and imagining Zack as his navigator, riding in the passenger seat, dictating rules about the correct snacks for each leg of the trip?
He pushed back from the table, frustrated, and decided that the correct snack for right now was a banana. Maybe a protein bar.
When he started musing about the kinds of protein bars Zack liked, he gave his brain a stern lecture about the appropriate time for that kind of obsession. Which was definitely not late afternoon on a Wednesday when he’d hardly gotten anything done all day.
He’d told Zack he was bored. But that was only partially it. The more complete truth was that he was restless. He liked his coaching clients, and had a curriculum all planned out for Marketing and SEO. All he had to do was choose a platform and fine-tune the material. A reptile specialty shop had been promoting some of his old Venomenon videos, which had given him a spike of likes/subscribes/comments.
None of it…inspired him.
This was Zack’s fault. Watching his eyes light up when he thought about what Crux could be, all the potential there, made Isaiah hungry for it. He loved that feeling, that high. He loved planning a whole business, phase by phase, and executing that plan. He loved it when things worked well, but he relished it when they didn’t and he had the opportunity to switch it all up, tweak it until he was hitting the right audience with the right message.
He liked all the stuff he was doing, but none of it lit him up like that. And he missed the rush of jumping into an idea like it was white water rapids, letting it sweep him away.
The only thing he was in danger of being swept away by at the moment was Zack, and every scenario Isaiah considered for a relationship ended badly. Some of them very badly. He’d tried to think around it, turn it inside out. He’d even taken a run and devoted all of that precious cognition time to convincing an imaginary Zack that it was worth taking a chance.
He couldn’t even convince himself. A sure sign he should give it up. But if it was that easy, he wouldn’t be standing in his kitchen contemplating a night out with Milo “and some Crux folks” tonight.
Did “and some Crux folks” include Zack? Because Isaiah hadn’t earned going out, not with his failure to complete really…anything all day. But if there was even a chance Zack would be there—if there was a chance of seeing him—he could work twice as hard tomorrow.
“Buckle down, boy,” he told himself. And called his dad for good measure.
They talked about his clients, the strange phenomenon of continued interest in old videos of him being bitten by things, and the bank where his dad worked.
Jimmy Carlin had worked two jobs for most of Isaiah’s life, trying to support his family. It wouldn’t have occurred to him to spend all day staring at blank screens or brainstorming new ideas. And if he had, he definitely wouldn’t have let himself off the hook by going out that night.
Hell. “Hey, Pops?”
His dad laughed. “I thought you were gonna wimp out. What is it, son? You didn’t call to catch up on bank gossip.”
“I happen to love catching up on bank gossip, old man. But no. I didn’t.”
“Uh huh.”
“Pops, how’d you work so hard and never…go out? Never take a night to sit at a bar with your friends? I don’t even remember you staying home when you were sick.”
“No, I don’t think I did.”
Rustling on the line. Isaiah imagined his dad settling into his leather armchair, massive water bottle on his side table, probably with a book open.
“I had you kids to take care of. I thought if your mother could see me, she’d want to see me working hard to make sure you three had everything you needed.”
Aw damn. Isaiah’s heart ached, a physical pain in his chest. “We did. We always did.”
“Well, as much as I could give you, anyway. It’s never enough. You’ll see when it’s your time, Isaiah. You never feel like you give your children enough.” He cleared his throat. “As it happens, I think I was wrong. I think your mother would have knocked me around if she’d really been looking down on me. There’s a balance, and I never showed you kids how to find it. Sometimes it’s worth taking a break, boy. You work hard enough.”
“Yeah, all right. Thanks, Pops.”
“Anything you need, you let me know. See you soon.”
“See you soon.” Isaiah paused before adding, “Love you.” It wasn’t necessarily a thing he was comfortable saying, or his dad was comfortable hearing. The old man had shown his love in a lot of ways, but hardly ever with words.
After a moment his dad said gruffly, “You too, son.”
Right, that lump in Isaiah’s throat was just thirst. He needed one of those big jugs of water, probably.
He filled a jar and took it back to his studio.
He’d already said no to Milo, and while he could still text back to ask where they were meeting up, he realized he no longer wanted to. Hanging out with Milo was always fun, but at this particular moment Isaiah was craving something more intimate. Seeing Zack in a bar or a club wouldn’t scratch the itch, so there wasn’t much point.
Still, he could work on his Zack project, which would feel both productive and like…a connection. An invisible thread connecting them.
Fanciful. Definitely silly. But it was the thing that got Isaiah’s fingers moving confidently on the keyboard for the first time all day. He wrote a proposed release schedule for the episodes, and outlined a relatively straightforward marketing plan for the series as a whole, including necessary steps for each individual release, a list of suggested graphics (series logo, inspirational images with quotes for each episode, banners for the gym’s social media pages—and if the gym didn’t already have social media pages, he strongly suggested they be set up before the yoga channel launched).
In truth, he planned to do as much as possible. But Zack needed to see the draft before it was finalized anyway, and knowing him he’d have insightful contributions.
Isaiah sat back, staring at the five page proposal, complete with calendar. This had gone beyond charity. Beyond helping out for Milo’s sake.
He couldn’t even fool himself that he was doing it out of some misguided desire to get a contact high off Zack’s emotional investment in Crux.
Each section had a list. And almost every list item had a name next to it: his or Zack’s.
