Room at the Top (22 page)

The sessions would end differently now.

“Kneel up,” Liam said, his voice shaking. “Hands behind your back.”

The order surprised Jay. He opened his mouth and allowed Liam’s cock to slip free, getting a good look at it as Liam got unsteadily to his feet. It was lavishly wet with his spit, gleaming, long and thick enough to make him wonder what it would feel like in his ass.

The thought carried with it a flash of longing for Austin to be here with them, but he was too preoccupied with rising smoothly to his knees to explore the connection fully.

His dick stuck up, the tip beaded with fluid, the chafed skin on the underside burning warmly. He wanted to see it, but he’d been told to do something with his hands. Oh yeah, behind his back…

Before he could complete the transition to the position Liam had told him to take, Liam’s hand struck him across the face, a hard slap that rocked his head to the side.

“Hands…behind…your…back,” Liam said dully, each word weighted, separated by a pause as if Liam was struggling to say them but knew they had to be said.

He was too shocked to do more than grunt, an instinctive protest that died as the heat in his face rose and his balls tightened warningly. He could taste blood, a faint trace of it in his mouth, threading through the saliva. He’d cut the inside of his cheek on a tooth. No,
Liam
had done that when he’d slapped him across the face. Jay wasn’t entirely sure how Liam felt about the slap—he’d gone kind of quiet—but Jay spun the act the way he wanted it to be. Liam had slapped him contemptuously, dismissively, a sharp reprimand to a sub who’d failed to obey him perfectly, exercising his dominance. Yes, that was what had happened, just the way it had in so many of Jay’s fantasies. Oh fuck, no, he couldn’t come too soon
again…

“Yes, Sir,” he said, hoping Liam would get his complete and utter approval of the way this scene was going.

“Close your eyes,” Liam said. “And don’t move.”

He obeyed those commands too, and a moment later heard Liam’s steps on the stairs. That came as a surprise and Jay almost peeked, but reminded himself there wouldn’t be anything to see except the empty room. He waited, skin prickling with anticipation, trying not to imagine what Liam might have planned.

The minutes felt like hours. It might have been ten minutes total before Liam returned. Something struck Jay’s chest, and he flinched, confused because he could tell Liam was barely inside the doorway.

“Open your eyes and put that on,” Liam ordered.

There was a leather cock ring on the rug in front of him. Jay picked it up and fastened it in place, gritting his teeth at the feel of the constriction.

“Wear that until you go to bed tonight,” Liam said. “Don’t touch yourself unless it’s absolutely necessary. Do you have any question about what that means?” He sounded angry.

“No, Sir,” Jay said.

“In the morning, put it on again. Wear it all day tomorrow until twenty-four hours from now. Adjust it if you must, but that’s all. You may not come until the twenty-four hours is up.” Liam looked at his watch, then waved dismissively. “Ten thirty tomorrow night. After that, what you choose to do is up to you.”

Jay swallowed, confused by how abruptly the session had ended and the sudden change in mood. He’d made Liam mad, and he wasn’t sure how. He found it hard to believe Liam was angry about a blowjob—for one thing, it had been a pretty great blowjob, and for another it seemed like a man who was comfortable playing dom to two gay subs wouldn’t be having a homosexual freak-out now. He waited for Liam to say something else, to explain.

Liam just stood there. “Well? Put on your clothes and go home.”

He should keep his mouth closed; he knew he should. But he couldn’t. “Should… Do you want me to—”

“For once in your life, Jay,” Liam said wearily, “just shut up and do as you’re told.” And he turned and left the room.

Chapter Thirteen

Austin sniffed experimentally through his nose after a night of mouth breathing, judging by the foul taste coating his tongue. He found that one nostril was clear. It was a whole new beautiful world. He sat up in bed, his head spinning, but the pounding agony of a sinus headache reduced to a whisper.

Thank God for extra-strength cold meds and the restorative power of eight hours of sleep. He drew a deep breath and called out, “Jay! Get in here. I can breathe!”

He sounded interestingly husky, not hoarse, and when he coughed it didn’t trigger a prolonged fit of even more coughing. Dying was officially canceled.

He knew Jay was awake; he’d heard Jay moving around in the kitchen area making breakfast, but he’d drifted back to sleep again without registering the fact that he could smell coffee. When Jay didn’t appear, he yelled his name again,

Jay stuck his head around the door, looking bleary-eyed and wearing sweats and a faded T-shirt. “Shouting. That’s a good sign, right?”

Austin beamed at him. “Hey, you. I feel better. Not, like, ready to scale tall buildings, but I can breathe again.”

“Heard you.” Jay came into the room, smothering a yawn. “Good. Great.”

“Yeah.” Austin felt deflated, but when Jay sat down on the bed and gave him an apologetic smile, sleepy and sweet as sugar, he forgave him for popping his bubble. “You don’t look so good. God, I didn’t give you my germs, did I?”

“You know I never catch colds.” Jay reached down to his groin and winced. He made a careful adjustment to his junk.

It was something Austin would’ve been happy to help him with when he’d had some coffee and was all the way awake, and when he’d had a nap.

“Ow.”

“Ow?” Austin peered down the bed, mildly curious. Everything looked normal as far as he could see. “Aftereffects of last night? Sorry I was dead to the world when you got back in. I wanted all the juicy details, but I knocked myself out with cold meds.”

“Juicy?” Jay sighed and plucked restlessly at the rumpled sheet. “Not sure that’s the right word. It was short and
not
sweet. I fucked up, Austin. I
told
you it was a bad idea me going by myself. I need you there to make sure I don’t do something stupid.”

Austin had settled himself against the pillows, but that made him sit up, alarm and concern dousing his euphoria at being on the mend, along with a dollop of guilt. He’d pushed Jay into doing the session solo, and his motives hadn’t been entirely unselfish. He’d wanted to sleep in peace so much, and Jay clattering about overhead had made that impossible. With Jay in that edgy mood, it’d seemed like a win-win situation to shoo him off to play. Make that a win-win-win. “Jay, whatever it was, we can fix it. Spill.”

“It was so fucking good at first.” Jay moaned, his eyes squeezing closed, his hands clutching the sheet beneath him. “Wish you’d been there to see it, hear the things he was saying to me.” He opened his eyes again and turned his head toward Austin, his dark gaze earnest. “You know how he never touches us? Not those kind of touches, anyway, but there’s always this feeling that he
wants
to; then he does something like kissing us on the shoulder when he thinks we won’t notice because our ass is on fire, and it makes us feel…”

“Twitchy, frustrated and confused,” Austin supplied and sighed. They’d talked about mentioning it to Liam but decided to hold off and hope he eventually got the message that they didn’t mind
where
he put his hands during a session or if he showed them some affection in the heat of the moment. Liam wasn’t a grope-happy creep like Niall. They trusted him. “Not as confused as he is. That man isn’t all the way straight, Jay. I’m not complaining, not at all, but he isn’t. He
can’t
be. Bi, maybe, yeah. Straight, no fucking way.”

They’d discussed that too. In fact, they talked about Liam a lot now that Austin thought about it. At first, it’d been the scene they’d focused on, but it’d slowly changed to a fascination with the man himself. Liam was so closed off, but during a scene that reserve cracked from time to time.

Jay stared up at the ceiling. “Yeah. So he put his finger in my ass. Not all the way, but it felt like he’d gotten the message too, so I, uh… “ He reached out and took Austin’s hand, his thumb smoothing the back of it in nervous, jerky sweeps. “I offered to blow him. Same deal as Patrick, I guess, but it felt… It wasn’t the same. Well, you weren’t there. I should’ve waited so we could do it together. I screwed it up. Fuck.
Fuck
.”

Austin rolled to his side and planted a firm kiss on Jay’s mouth, noting absently it was swollen on one side. “Stop it. You might screw up when it comes to reheating soup and remembering my birthday, but there is no way, none, that you could ever screw up a blowjob. Seriously. Just not possible.”

Jay sighed and returned the kiss. “He did that thing I wanted him to. You know. The slap.” Jay stuck out his tongue, exploring his lip. “Really good job. Hurt at the time, and you can’t see a mark on my face, but I caught the inside of my cheek against my tooth.”

Austin guessed Jay had spent some time in front of the mirror checking out his face, half-disappointed that it
wasn’t
marked. “Is your mouth okay? Did you wash it out with salt water?”

Jay nodded and gave Austin’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “Yeah. It’s fine. I was just so turned on when he did it. Jesus.”

“I’m not surprised. You’ve been waiting for him to do that for weeks.” Austin groaned. “God, I missed that too. Okay, you were right. No more solo sessions.”

“I’m kind of glad you weren’t there right then. It got weird. He basically just threw a cock ring at me and kicked me out.” Jay let go of Austin’s hand and ran his fingers over his cock, exploring its outline over and over as if he couldn’t keep from touching it. “I’ve got to keep it on until tonight. He’s never done something that carried on after everything was over. It’s all different, and it’s
all my fault
.”

Austin flopped back against his pillows and joined Jay in staring at the ceiling, turning over what had happened in his head. “First off,” he said slowly, “I don’t think it’s your fault. It was, like, a different dynamic because I wasn’t there. Not bad, just different, you know?”

“Yeah.” Jay didn’t sound convinced.

“Second, whatever happened, we’ll deal with it. Things with Patrick weren’t always smooth sailing either, and we worked that out.”

“And then he
left
.” Flopping sideways dramatically, Jay put the back of his hand to his forehead, then opened one eye. “Think I could get an Oscar?”

“It’s never too late for a new career,” Austin said and patted Jay’s hip. “So he came, but he didn’t let you come?”

“Uh-huh. I know he liked it. How could he not have liked it?” Jay pouted.

“Maybe he liked it too much.” Austin sighed and—as much as he wanted to touch Jay’s cock—he didn’t. “I’ll call him later, okay?”

“Okay. But for now can we talk about something else? Because my dick hurts, and if we focus on this, it’s going to be harder. To ignore.”

Austin took a long, hot shower, which felt amazing after days of being sick, and let Jay feed him pancakes. He only managed to eat one, but he wasn’t worried about his lack of appetite. He knew from experience that it would return, and probably with a vengeance. He fielded two phone calls, one from his boss and the second from his mother, who had another half dozen complaints about April that he tried to let go in one ear and out the other. It wasn’t until almost lunchtime that Jay went up to work on his diorama and Austin was able to make a phone call he could concentrate on.

The phone at Liam’s end rang for so long Austin was almost ready to hang up. “Hello,” Liam said finally.

“Hi, it’s me. Austin.”

“Oh yes. Hello.” Liam sounded distant and uninterested, but Austin was well equipped to deal with teen-style angst even when it came from a middle-aged man.

“Jay’s upset,” he said bluntly. “So I wanted to touch base and see if you were too.”

“No, of course not. Why would I be upset?”

Austin sighed and sat down on the edge of his bed, where the covers were a lumpy and uncomfortable tangle. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Pretend like everything’s fine and you don’t care. I know you care. So take some deep breaths and talk to me.”

It was quiet. Austin wondered if Liam was actually following his advice and breathing. If not, chances were the next sound he was going to hear would be the dial tone.

“Is Jay all right?” Liam asked eventually, finally sounding like a human being and not a robot.

“He thinks he did something wrong.”

“He didn’t. If there were mistakes made, they were mine, not his.”

“What mistakes?” Austin stood and started to pick up wadded, damp tissues from the floor.

“Would you like a list?” Liam asked bitterly. “I let things get out of hand, I lost control of the situation and myself, and I broke the verbal contract we’d made.”

“You sound like a lawyer,” Austin pointed out.

“The shoe fits. Or near enough.”

“Is this a gay-sex thing?”

Liam grumbled. “I’m nearly forty, Austin. I’m a bit long in the tooth to be worrying about a sudden sexual epiphany.”

The tissues went in the trash, and Austin began to strip the covers off the bed one-handed. Laundry day. Definitely. “Yeah? I think it’d be more of a shock the older you got.”

“Well, it isn’t.” Liam sounded peevish, which only heightened Austin’s feeling that he was dealing with his sister in a really bad mood. It made him feel exhausted sometimes, always being the one in charge. It didn’t take a degree in psychology to work out that part of the attraction of submission for him, though he knew letting someone else drive for a while wasn’t the only reason he loved to kneel for a man like Liam.

“It wasn’t a shock to us, if that helps.” The fitted sheet was stuck, one corner resisting his tugs. He walked around the bed and eased the corner out from under the mattress.

“Excuse me?”

It had been exhilarating and liberating to talk to Liam without watching every word, but the ice around Liam’s last words was a wake-up call that playtime was over. He’d gone too far to back down yet, though.