Foster Siblings 3: Brokedown Hearts (32 page)

With one hand, Ben slammed the door behind him. Still branding David with the heat of his kiss, Ben walked them deeper into the room. Long minutes passed before Ben came up for air. When he did, an inferno burned in his stare, and he didn’t let David get away. “Taste that?” He dipped down and nipped David’s lips, and then soothed them with a soft lick. “Can you taste my attraction and desire for you?” He pressed David’s hand to his chest, over the fast beat of his heart, and then forced it down over his flat stomach to the defined ridge shaping the front of his jeans. “Do you feel how much passion I have for you?”

Ben’s cock pulsed in David’s hand, and the power contained within sent a tremble through David. “Yes.” Up on his toes, David leaned in and stole a kiss. “Heaven help me, I do. And I love it. I already crave it.” Tugging Ben’s lower lip between his teeth, David pushed his hands under Ben’s shirt and ran his fingers over smooth, firm flesh, starved for contact with this man again. “I crave you.”

When David went in for another kiss, this time Ben strong-armed him and set him a measure away. Hurt stabbed through David. He tried to scramble back into Ben’s arms, but Ben shook him, said, “Stop,” and David immediately stilled and complied.

Just as fast as Ben had shut David up, all the hard lines dominating Ben’s features abated. “Come here, honey.” Grabbing David’s hand, Ben took a seat at the foot of the bed and positioned David in front of him. He looked up at David, and David didn’t mistake the smoothed edges for softness. “Here’s the thing,” Ben began, and David’s pulse leaped into tenth gear. “The next time you think about following me, remember that I am with you already, and know that there is no threat out there that can compete with how much I already want and desire you.” Ben squeezed David’s thigh, as if imploring with his fingers. “And also, the next time you’re contemplating following me, remember that tracking people and being aware of my surroundings are part of my profession, and no matter how good you get, I will always be one step ahead and know you are there. You will never fool me, and you will never get away with it.”

Oh God. He already knows
. David started to worry his lower lip, but Ben lifted partway and rubbed the chewed area, making David stop.

Squeezing David’s hand, swinging it in a sweet way, Ben sat back down. “I’m not mad at you. I’m not even a little bit upset. You have some compulsive ways that are hard to combat; I get that, and I do not judge you for them. I want you to work past those issues because I know they torment you, and I don’t like to see you in pain, whether it’s self-inflicted or otherwise.” Some of Ben’s more severe lines took prominence again, and his frown turned his lush mouth into a thin, slashing line. “But also know that I’m gonna call you out every time you slip into one of those patterns with me. I won’t ignore it, and I’ll never let you think you’re getting away with it. I don’t like being followed. I don’t like that it means you don’t trust me. Most important, I know it isn’t healthy for you to do it.”

Once Ben nodded that he’d finished, David took Ben’s hands and kissed the backs of both. “I’m sorry I did it. But if you saw me following you the whole way, then you know I came home before you left Tampa. I did that because I knew what I was doing was wrong. It finally penetrated my brain, and I overcame my urges, and I left while you were still in your apartment. I was going to tell you what I’d done.” His heart squeezing terribly, David clutched Ben’s hands hard. “I wasn’t going to keep it a secret.” His skin heated as he admitted, “I just hadn’t figured out how to tell you the truth.”

Ben’s mouth ticked up at the edges, and he brushed his thumb across David’s cheek. “You’re keeping your head up. You’re owning your actions.” He reversed the holds of their hands, kissed the center of each of David’s palms, and in between said, “You’re making me very proud of you right now. Hand to God, it’s the truth.”

A gush of pure love rushed through David’s entire being, flooding him with a glut of endorphins. Suddenly light-headed, he wobbled and folded to the floor between Ben’s legs. “I don’t know what it is about you, Ben Evans”—winding his arms around Ben’s waist, David pressed his cheek against Ben’s wide chest and whispered thickly—“but I think I’m starting to live for your approval and kindness and support.”

“Good. You have it.” With two fingers under David’s chin, Ben drew him out of hiding. “Now get into my bag for me there.” A wicked twinkle brought out the green in Ben’s eyes. “On the way back from Tampa, I bought plenty of condoms and a bunch of new lubes.” Ben ran his hand down David’s spine, pushed into the back of his jeans, and tormented David by grazing his crack. Ben then took his hand away and smacked David on the ass. “Pick something out and get your hole ready for me.”

A hum went all the way through David, awakening him completely. Still kneeling between Ben’s legs, David pushed up so very close to the man and not so accidentally let the front of his body rub against Ben’s cock. Ben hissed, but he grinned too. He undid his jeans, freeing his shaft.

The sight of Ben’s dark cock, the hood still partially covering the head, made David’s passage squeeze with need. David hastened his steps and quickly removed his clothes, kicking them aside, and then bent over to get into Ben’s bag. With his ass sticking out, inches from Ben’s face, David knew without looking that Ben couldn’t keep his stare away and that the man had begun jerking on his dick.

I turn him on just as much as he excites me
. The knowledge, the sense of power and belonging, made David search through the items in the bag faster. He didn’t want to make his man wait. David ran his hand over a tube of “ultrathick anal lube” first and didn’t bother examining the rest. He threw the first box of condoms he touched back to Ben and then used his teeth to break the cellophane off the lubricant.

With a good dollop of the thick stuff on his fingers, David reached back and fingered his entrance. His pucker pulsed with first contact, but too excited for Ben’s cock to wait, David forced his middle finger all the way into his ass. His inner muscles contracted, automatically trying to push him out, but the hints of upcoming pleasure already began feathering through the walls of his channel, and David deliberately rubbed his prostate to increase the pleasure.

With only a few soft brushes from the pad of his finger, David blossomed to full erection, and the gentle awakening in his rectum increased to a scream of need. He eased his pointer digit in next to his middle finger, and just imagining that he hadn’t yet gotten to half the thickness of Ben’s cock made his tunnel squeeze. David moaned in anticipation of what would soon happen and began to pump his fingers within his throbbing ass.

Behind David, still on the bed, Ben groaned. He grabbed David by the hips and dragged him back, facing away, until he stood between Ben’s spread thighs. “Fucking shit, you are sexy. I can’t let you do that and not step in.” Ben pressed the softest kiss to the small of David’s back and whispered against his skin, “Let me take care of stretching you myself.”

Eager to put himself in Ben’s capable hands, David withdrew his penetration, folded over at the waist, and grabbed his ankles. Growling his appreciation, Ben licked David’s nerve-rich asshole and then flicked the muscle oh so incredibly gently, making David’s bud quiver. Ben then ran two fingers around the rapidly closing rim, prepping the shy entrance with more cool lube, and finally, with steady precision, pushed three long fingers into David’s hungry ass.

As delicious sensations raced through David’s system, he released a primal cry of need. He flared inside and hugged Ben’s invasion with his anal walls. Ben stroked David’s sweet spot, and David whimpered with acute pleasure as he once more slipped into heaven.

In his soul, David knew this was exactly how his life with Ben was supposed to be.

* * * *

Hours later, prowling around in the darkness, Ben swung his arms back and forth and side to side, searching for a quiet way to unleash the animalistic energy within calling him to fuck David again. Ben had taken David twice tonight already; pair that with the above-average amount of ass play the guy had dealt with from Ben since they’d hooked up—especially since David had been a virgin and new to all this—and Ben knew he could not roll David over and plunge into his ass one more time. No, that wasn’t technically correct. Not
could not
. Ben
would not
take David again tonight. In Ben’s gut, even with everything that had happened, with the breach of trust between them, Ben knew that if he crawled into bed and kissed David awake, if he warmed the man up, David would beg for Ben to fuck him, no matter the tenderness or pain in his body.

I can’t do that
. Half-hard, already pushing toward another painful erection, Ben threw himself into one of the chairs at the table and exhaled loudly.
I can’t let him hurt himself to feed that need in him to please me.

Whether David understood or recognized his nature, the man had submissive tendencies born from the very core of his soul. And Jesus God, how those inclinations so perfectly melded with Ben’s desires to dominate and assume control in everything.

Once again Braden’s assertion that Ben only liked David because he served Ben’s desire to be needed by a man poked at Ben’s psyche and made him feel sick to his stomach. Ben didn’t want to be a user of people, particularly not a sweet, vulnerable guy like David. One careless wrong word from Ben would crush David and could send him reeling worse than the small backpedaling he’d done to his recovery earlier in the day.
Do I really want to be so necessary to another man that my anger or disappointment or a change in my feelings could crush his soul?

With that thought, rather than Ben’s erection dwindling, his shaft filled with more blood and pushed against his belly. Ben’s need to take David right now lit even hotter.
Fuck
. The insatiable, starving part of Ben’s soul, both the sexual and emotional black holes that lived inside him, were fucked up and twisted beyond repair. The truth was, as warped as the desire was, Ben did want to be that important to another man.
Not any man, though. David
. Ben wanted to be David’s world. He wanted to take care of the guy. He wanted to feed David, clothe him, provide him with the safest shelter he’d ever known. He wanted to learn David so well that he could anticipate the things that would make David happy before David realized them himself, and then Ben wanted to give David all those things so David never experienced sadness or loneliness again. Ben wanted to be responsible for anything and everything related to David’s life. He welcomed the responsibility. He craved it.

Fucking shit. No, I can’t
. Ben had experienced and acknowledged this need in him before, but never had so many facets emerged at the same time or shown themselves as necessary parts to his happiness, not until David had come into his life. Now Ben couldn’t seem to stuff them back down inside, the way he’d always so successfully done before.

Pushing his hands through his hair, Ben muttered, “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” and banged his head against the table. After the third hit, a piece of paper stuck to Ben’s forehead. He peeled it off, and after squinting at the scribble of lines in the dark, he reached out and flipped on a desk lamp David had added to the room.

Soft light shone on the paper, highlighting shelter phone numbers in other areas of Florida.
Is he thinking about moving?
Growling, Ben dragged a folder off a pile, opened it, and began sifting through the printed pages. All of them were of various animal shelter websites, and each sheet of paper had items checkmarked or things crossed out, with notes about liking or disliking some feature of the particular website and why. After opening a second file and then a third, Ben scanned more printed pages with notes about building a functional and appealing website, and how to gain the most traffic and acquire the most hits on search engines, as well as pages of inspirational stories about thriving shelter rescues and animal lives saved, to celebrities with ties to Florida who had expressed affection for animals. Pen-written notes about other famous people who’d advocated on behalf of shelters were scribbled here and there, along with thoughts of the likelihood of getting a famous face for Erin’s sanctuary.

Holy fuck
. Astonished by the depth of research David had done in relation to Erin’s shelter, Ben shuffled through more pages, eager to know everything.
He’s doing so much better than I thought
. Pride tightened Ben’s chest, and then a low punch bruised his middle.
What if he succeeds so well he doesn’t need me anymore?

Right then a rustling in the bed pulled Ben’s attention. David, twisted in the sheets, rolled to his side and wiped his eyes. “Ben?” He looked over at the 3:51 glowing on the alarm clock, and sleep scratched his voice as he added, “It’s the middle of the night. Why aren’t you sleeping?” Shifting up against the headboard, David narrowed his focus on the mess Ben had made of the table. “Why are you looking at my work stuff?”

Ben parted his lips, but nothing came out. How could he explain that he hadn’t even paused when opening the first folder? How could he reveal to David that he believed it was his right to look at anything of David’s? That anything that was David’s was automatically his property too?

When Ben didn’t answer for a prolonged moment, David sat up straighter and switched on the lamp beside the bed. “Are you okay?” He looked Ben up and down slowly, and Ben swore the man’s too-blue gaze absorbed every imperfection, fear, and personality flaw Ben had spent his life trying so hard to hide from others. After a good minute of silence, wherein Ben struggled not to squirm under David’s scrutiny, David murmured, “It sounds crazy, but all I can think is that you look like you, but at the same time you don’t. Is everything all right?”

His heart thudding much too fast, Ben fingered the sheets of pages scattered on the table. “I didn’t know you were working on a website for the shelter.” He changed the direction of David’s questions. “Why didn’t you mention it?”

“I wasn’t sure I could do it.” A familiar tell of nerves from David emerged. He switched from sitting up straight to pulling against the headboard and chewing on one of his fingernails. “I went to school for stuff almost like this, but that was so long ago, and with computers and programs and website building, things change fast.” David shrugged, hugged his knees to his chest, and his voice dropped to a near whisper. “I didn’t want to say anything in case I failed.”