The Virgin Master (22 page)

“Seemed pretty clear to me. You said you could never have feelings for me, so…”

“I didn’t say that quite right. What I meant to say is that I’m
afraid
to have feelings for you.” Evan shifted and chewed his bottom lip while he tried to gather his thoughts.

“Evan….you either have feelings for me or you don’t. I mean…you can’t just decide to have feelings or not
…
they just happen.” Jeremy still wouldn’t look at him.

You got that right .
Evan sighed.

He dropped down on his pillow and rolled over, lying on his back beside Jeremy looking up at the ceiling. “I’m so fucked up.” He blew out air in a huff. “It’s too much
,
too fast for me, okay? I….I went out to talk to some of my friends, yesterday
afternoon and Chris, my best friend, told me I was being selfish. That I was too afraid to open up to anybody else because I couldn’t stand the pain of losing someone I care about again. That I was using my grief and the whole idea of being faithful to Justin’s memory as excuses to
stop living. That made me really angry for a minute.”

Evan rolled toward Jeremy, lying on his side and caught Jeremy looking at him. “He’s right.
Jer
…I already feel like I might die if

somebody took you away from me. If…I let you all the way in and…something happens, I won’t survive it. I noticed you, too, at Stanford. If I hadn’t already been so in love with Justin….I would have tried to get to know you better then. You’ve been nothing but honest with me. I haven’t been able to be completely honest with you, because I’ve been lying to myself. Can we start over, maybe? Can I have another chance?”

J
eremy looked at Evan
and
leaned sideways rest
ing
his
forehead on Evan’s.

“A good question to ask me right now, would be: what would I do if I was free to choose?”

“
Yes?”

“I’m not free to choose. Even if I weren’t
legally
your property,
I would still belong to you.”

Evan thought for a minute until he realized what Jeremy meant. Warmth flooded his chest and he tentatively brushed his lips across Jeremy’s, gasping at the sheer strength of the connection he felt to him. Jeremy drew him into a long, slow, tender kiss and time stopped. Nothing existed for Evan but Jeremy. It could have been
minutes or hours but finally they drew apart and smiled. Evan reached out and traced Jeremy’s cheek bone with gentle finger tips. He drew a breath and decided he had to tell Jeremy the rest of what bothered him.

“There’s something else.”

J
eremy opened his eyes which had closed lazily in pleasure as
  
Evan stroked his face. “I’m not g
oing to like this at all, am I?

“Probably not, but you have to know. When we were doing the discipline test? It, uh... I…”

Evan floundered for some way to put it that wouldn’t make him sound as vile as he was.

“It turned you on.” Jeremy said. “I noticed.”

Evan flushed, fell over and hid his face in one of Jeremy’s pillows. He felt Jeremy stroking his hair gently. “Ev….part of it turned me on, too.”

Evan cautiously raised his head and met Jeremy’s amused glance.
“Really?”

“Yeah. The whole idea of being restrained like that so that you
 
could do anything you wanted to me, well…I liked that. I liked
how the
s
panking made me feel when it was over. All this heat just
rolled over my body. I mean, you did notice I got an erection?”

“Hard to miss.”

Jeremy grinned at him. “I can’t say I enjoyed the flogger or the crop at all
…
”

E
van flushed. “I
…
I think the noise you made when I had to do that….”

“Evan….you don’t have to justify how you feel, or even try to figure out why you feel it. I mean, just because that got a reaction from you that you don’t understand doesn’t mean that I have to look forward to a good-night flogging from now on, does it?”

Evan shuddered. “God, no. I never want to hurt you like that ever again.”

“E
ven if it did turn you on,
right? I mean it’s not like you
need any help getting it up, or anything.” Jeremy leered at
   
Evan, who blushed again.

“No.”

“Do you sit around fa
ntasizing about hitting me
with
the
flogger or the crop?”

Evan hesitated. “I had a dream about spanking you.”

Jeremy chuckled. “I can see that. Was I restrained in the discipline area?”

“No. Naked across my lap.”

Jeremy’s eyes glazed. “Uh, that sounds pretty hot. We can do that sometime, you know, when I’ve been bad.” He grinned at Evan. “I can always be a little bit bad on purpose.”

Evan laughed. “We haven’t even done anything yet.
             
Let’s save the kink for later.”

“Yet? You said ‘yet’.” Jeremy’s voice had a note of hopeful triumph.

Evan just stared into his eyes for a long moment. “You know you’re not making this very easy for me. I thought we would just live together like roommates or brothers or something. I was all right with that. But then, you’re so fucking unbelievably beautiful, inside and out. I’m afraid that if you didn’t want me, I might have forced you. I can’t be like that.”

“You’ll never have to find out, because I do, very definitely, want you.” Jeremy rolled over on top of Evan, pressing him to the floor, rolling his hips against Evan’s groin and finding the long line of hard flesh there. Evan gasped and arched up into him, uncontrollably.

“Hey, who’s the Master here?”

“I wonder.”

Chapter
Fifteen

Jeremy smiled and kissed Evan deeply, exploring every centimeter of his mouth and tongue, wringing moans and little gasps
out of him.
Evan melted into the floor; tensions he didn’t even know he had flowing away as his focus narrowed to Jeremy’s mouth, and Jeremy’s erection stroking his own through their clothing as they both futil
ely strove to get closer to one
another. He was going to come in one of his most expensive suits. But then, that’s
what dry cleaning was meant for.

J
eremy reached down and tugged at one of Evan’s hardened nipples and that was it. Evan came with a bitten off shout, biting his lower lip hard enough to bring blood. The sight of Evan losing control for him pushed Jeremy over the edge, too. They lay there, basking in physical and emotional satisfaction. Evan finally broke the mood before they both went to sleep there on Jeremy’s floor by kissing Jeremy on the tip of his nose and pulling away slightly.

“Okay, we’re going to do this. So, do you want to sleep in my room from now on?”

“I hope you mean in your bed and not on the floor or something. I mean I have to ask. According to a lot of the web sites, that’s considered normal.”

Evan snorted. “Of course in the bed.”

“Well, then, yes. Right now, please.”

Evan grinned. “No, not right now. We still have most of the work day left and I’m sure Jeff needs that spreadsheet you were working on. So, we’re good?”

“Oh, yeah. Except I’m all sticky now.”

“Consider that your punishment for manhandling me.”

“Aren’t you sticky?”

“Yep. But I have another
suit and extra underwear in my
office.”
 
Evan felt smug.

“Why?”

“I used to work all night sometimes, so I would just shower and get dressed in my office.”

“Your apartment is like fifty feet away.”

“I
know. That still seemed like too much time to be away from the office.”

 
             
Jeremy just stared
at him. “Man, you were totally
fucked up.”

“
I really was. I still am to some degree. Don’t expect
menot
to have doubts and not to backslide here and there.”

Jeremy threw him a predatory look. “You’re going to be
too busy and way too happy and tired to get very introspective.”

E
van’s stomach fluttered wildly and he gulped. “Don’t
             
make
promises you can’t keep, Paxton.”

“The only person who could stop me from keeping that promise is you, James.”

E
van virtually fled back to his office before he started something he would have to finish.

Evan could not recall e
ver having been so nervous. The
first time he slept with Justin he had not been expecting things to go as far as they did and he didn’t have time to get nervous. Justin had been experienced and it was all new to Evan. Now he was the more experienced one. This thing with Jeremy
…
it was all up to him to set the pace. He wished he knew what would be okay with
Jeremy
.
Evan
wanted to fuck Jeremy blind and then have him return the favor. But how would he feel afterwards?  He did not enjoy his
little
trips to the mental woodshed. As he lay in bed waiting for Jeremy to finish showering, he nearly vibrated in anticipation.

Jeremy emerged from the en suite in a cloud of steam, wrapped in a towel and turned to the dresser mirror to finish combing out his hair, and Evan’s mind went on vacation. He never got tired of just looking at Jeremy. And there was so much
to see. Right this minute though
that towel had to be history. Evan got out of bed and grabbed the end of the towel, snatching it away.

“Hey!” Je
r
emy smirked at Evan in the mirror. “Can’t wait, huh?”

Evan eyed Jeremy’s bobbing erection. “Looks like I’m not the only one. Put down that comb
. O
r better yet, let me have it.” Evan held out his hand imperiously. Jeremy gave him the comb and Evan dragged him over and pushed him down onto the bed. Jeremy
chuckled
. Evan came perilously close to joining him. He sat down behind Jeremy and began working the comb through his long dark blonde locks, humming to himself. Jeremy scooted back until he sat between Evan’s legs, Evan’s hard length pressed between Jeremy’s muscular back and his own taut stomach.

Evan tried to keep his mind on combing Jeremy’s hair, but his neck was
right there
, begging to be licked and nibbled. Evan tossed the comb, being nearly finished anyway, and succumbed to his body’s apparent need to chew on his….
what? Not slave, not really. Not lover, not yet. Just Jeremy.
Evan licked the few drops of moisture remaining on Jeremy’s neck and got lost in tasting and sucking and nibbling.
Jeremy
let his head fall back and to the side giving Evan total access and ground his ass back against Evan’s erection drawing a growl out of his
m
aster.

Evan experimented with nuzzling and biting Jeremy’s ear and got some really beautiful noisy responses, so he switched to the other side. Jeremy trembled in his arms. Evan pulled until Jeremy lay back across the bed, pinning Evan’s legs. Pulling his legs out from under Jeremy with some difficulty, Evan wriggled over on top of Jeremy and kissed him lightly.