He shook it off and turned to the rocks just ahead of him, his heart pounding as loudly in his ears as the surf on the shore. Just on the other side, he knew it. He felt it.
Raoul’s shoes fell from his grasp as he rounded the corner, into the shelter of the two manmade lines of rocks. Everything felt familiar. Even though he knew he’d never been here before, he felt as though he were coming home. Especially when he spotted the silent figure of Raoul. He was on his knees, head bent, unmoving.
“Raoul!” Alexx cried out, every single emotion he possessed, all the love in his heart, packed into that single word. The dark head lifted, turned toward him. The dark eyes appeared wet. They widened at the sight of him. He hurtled toward Raoul and leapt on him. They fell together on the grassy sand, their lips pressed together, arms wound tightly about one another.
And suddenly all was right with the world once more.
Raoul kissed Alexx with a feverish intensity, moaning his name into his soft flesh. They stripped one another in record time. Raoul laid the pieces of clothing beneath them as protection against the rocky sand. Their tongues tangled in wordless communion, their hands caressing, stroking, inflaming one another’s lust.
They rolled back and forth, limbs entwined, cocks rubbing together in the most exquisite torture. When Raoul tried to take the bottom position for himself, Alexx slid beneath him instead.
“Make love to me, Raoul,” he whispered, his voice sending shivers that shot straight down Raoul’s spine. There was nothing Raoul wanted to do more. But he wasn’t prepared for this eventuality, hadn’t anticipated it. Certainly not in this place.
“I don’t have any condoms,” he confessed, a note of frustrated
chagrin in his voice, compounded by his desire for Alexx.
“We don’t need them.” Alexx traced the contour of Raoul’s lips with one finger. “You’re the only man I’ve ever been with, the only one I ever want to be with. Please, I want to feel you, only you, inside of me…”
Raoul melted at his words, berating himself internally. How could he not have known, not have realized that Alexx was an innocent, an untouched virgin until Raoul came along? In all fairness, Alexx had not reacted as he would have expected. It didn’t matter, not now, but the knowledge only served to reinforce the idea that they were meant to be together, for they fit together as perfectly as if they’d been made for one another.
Raoul continued to protest, but his heart was not in it, and he felt himself surrender as Alexx claimed his lips, stifling his words with his mouth. Their tongues fought for supremacy in a mock battle of wills that ended when Alexx lightly nipped Raoul’s lower lip. The simple bite sent an erotic shiver coursing deliciously through his body.
Alexx drew back slightly, touching his finger to Raoul’s lip.
When he lifted it, a spot of blood shone there. He placed the finger into his own mouth and sucked on it, a gesture that went straight to Raoul’s cock.
Alexx raised his head, baring his throat. “Bite me,” he whispered in a sultry voice. “Bite me, Raoul.”
A low rumble issued from Raoul’s lips, as he growled, “I’m no vampire.”
“No, you’re a wolf,” Alexx rejoined. “You’re my sexy, beautiful, wonderful wolf.”
Raoul puddled inside.
“I want you to have my blood. I want to be a part of you, as
you are of me.”
Compromising, Raoul ran his tongue up along that pale, slender neck before settling for a reciprocal nip on Alexx’s lower lip; not hard, just enough to produce a little blood that he sucked into his mouth, savored and swallowed. Alexx writhed beneath him with an increasing agitation that was matched by Raoul’s growing desire.
“Please fuck me,” Alexx whispered. “Raoul, please…make me yours in every way you can…every position you can think of.” He reached between them, grasping Raoul’s hard cock tightly. “Mark me as yours, Raoul,” he murmured, before he released him, to Raoul’s great dismay. Swiftly pivoting beneath him, he dropped onto all fours in a submissive posture. His pale ass gleamed invitingly in the moonlight. He wriggled it enticingly, which only served to fan the flames of Raoul’s passion. Raoul wanted to taste Alexx, everywhere—to claim him, to mark him, to devour him.
Most of all, he wanted to love him, he realized, the knowledge both astounding him and filling him as the truth penetrated every fiber of his being. He didn’t stop to question it—he simply obeyed.
He pushed apart the tantalizing rounded globes and gently ran his tongue up along his perineum and over his pucker, eliciting a shiver and a moan from Alexx. Raoul kissed the pucker, again and again as Alexx pushed back against him, encouraging him. He slid the tip of his tongue inside the opening, felt the tight protective ring of muscles there, relaxing them the farther he penetrated Alexx’s hole with his tongue.
He dropped one hand between Alexx’s legs. Palming his weeping cock, he began to pump it firmly. The effect on Alexx was immediate, His entire body vibrated, and his moans increased in intensity.
“You’re torturing me, Raoul. Please,” he pleaded.
Raoul was torn between drawing out their lovemaking and pleasing his lover, between sating Alexx and quenching his own unending thirst for the redhead. His libido insisted that he claim Alexx now. That soft lovemaking could wait for a softer environment, such as their bed. The latter argument held sway in the end.
He pushed his tongue as far as it would go, licking inside of him, his tongue encased in all that tight, beautiful heat. Alexx squirmed under his touch, whimpering. Raoul pulled back, and began to lick Alexx in a methodical manner, imprinting him with his own scent, thoroughly marking him as Raoul’s and no one else’s. Every square inch of flesh on Alexx’s body was his and he wanted it. By the time he was done, he sensed that Alexx had been pushed to his limit, panting and quivering needily.
Raoul rolled his lover over, gently, so that he could look into his beautiful blue eyes. Using the pre-cum from Alexx’s cock as a lubricant, Raoul thoroughly coated his own cock, but when he moved his fingers toward him, to prepare him, Alexx resisted and gripped Raoul’s cock instead.
“No, you,” he insisted, and Raoul could do no less than give in to his lover’s wishes.
Kneeling between Alexx’s legs, he entered him in one fluid motion, evoking a heartfelt cry as their bodies blended and became one. Alexx scissored his legs about Raoul’s waist, moving his hips to match Raoul’s thrusts, in perfect unison, one with the other.
Raoul felt the way Alexx’s heels fit perfectly in the space at the base of his spine, felt the way that he fit perfectly inside of Alexx, all of the pieces falling into place, everything aligned once more.
Alexx pulled Raoul down to him, claiming his lips with a rising
urgency, swallowing their moans, muffling them. Raoul reached between them. Alexx’s cock was pressed against their joined flesh.
His hand encountered Alexx’s, and together they pumped his cock in sync with Raoul’s driving strokes until, with exquisite timing, they each found their release within heartbeats of one another.
Afterward, they cuddled as well as they could on the uneven terrain. Raoul finally got his way and rolled onto the bottom, pillowing Alexx against his body, away from the rocky sand, holding him close as he peppered his face with tender kisses.
Nothing was spoken between them for long moments, content to bask in the afterglow of their lovemaking.
“I’m sorry,” Raoul whispered at last, his hand gently stroking the length of Alexx’s back.
“For what?” Alexx raised questioning eyes.
“For worrying you. For running from you. For not telling you what I should have told you.”
“You can tell me now,” Alexx whispered, using his hands to comfort, to minister, and most of all to love.
Raoul drew a deep, shuddering breath, giving in to the emotions that surged through him, emotions he thought long dead and buried. But they weren’t. Alexx had brought them to the fore once more, brought Raoul back to life again in a way he once thought impossible. He met Alexx’s eyes with his own.
“I love you, Alexx,” he murmured, the words feeling more than right.
Alexx’s smile was blinding in its beauty. “I love you too,” he returned. “You can tell me anything.” He reached for Raoul’s hand, squeezed it reassuringly.
“A long time ago,” Raoul began, pulling the words from deep inside his soul, “when I was just a child… That’s when I met
Jamie…”
*
Sometimes the words flowed, at other times they were halting, unsure, especially when he described how Jamie died, guilt pouring from him in great waves—guilt, remorse, and so much more.
Alexx passed no judgment. He never stopped touching Raoul as he listened to him, his fingers trailing over his chest, along his throat, his jaw, his lips. Raoul never protested, never asked him to stop, so he continued his touches, reassurances of his understanding. His heart ached for Raoul as he listened to his pain and his sorrow.
“That’s why…when I heard you whistling…that song…I just freaked out,” Raoul concluded, his eyes imploring forgiveness.
“I’d heard it so often. All the time. Even the night he died…” His words trailed away. He ran his tongue across his lips. A small laugh emerged, a self-deprecating chuckle. “I was beginning to wonder if you were Jamie, brought back to life. I mean, when I looked into your eyes, there in the bathroom… I thought I saw something. I know, tell me I’m crazy.”
“You’re not crazy.” Alexx kissed him. “Not crazy at all. Well, at least not in that way.” He gave Raoul a mischievous look, and he was rewarded by a bigger smile.
“Hush you,” Raoul admonished him. “Besides, even if I did believe in that shit, it’s not possible. You’re too old. He’s only been gone for twenty years. You’re over twenty-one.”
Alexx’s blood ran cold at those words, a shiver running
through his frame.
“What’s the matter? Getting cold? Maybe we should—”
“Um, Raoul…” Alexx’s voice pitched higher than he would have liked. He cleared his throat, began again. “About that…”
Raoul gave him a quizzical look, his dark eyebrows arching.
“Um, well… You remember when we met, how you got called downstairs on our account, mine and Miller’s, because of an ID?”
“Yes, of course. The bouncers questioned your IDs. Well, mostly yours, not your friend so much.”
“Yeah, mine. Not Miller’s. He’s thirty, way old enough.
Remember how when Foster vouched for me, the matter was dropped? And you left?”
“Yes, I remember. It was the full moon, I had to go. So?”
“Well…” Alexx drew out the syllable until it felt like several.
“You see…that ID actually
was
fake.” He braced himself for Raoul’s anger, but was surprised when he began to laugh instead.
“Well, I’ll be damned. I guess I should have looked at the damn thing a little closer. I’ll have to remember that in future. Please tell me you’re not under eighteen, and that I haven’t been committing statutory?”
“Oh no, no,” Alexx hastened to assure him. “I’m over eighteen.
I did graduate from high school, just like I said. Two years ago, in fact. I’m twenty. I’ll be twenty-one next Halloween.”
“Next Halloween?”
Alexx watched as Raoul seemed to grow pale, his brow furrowed in confusion. “That means that you were born…”
“October 31, 1992,” Alexx supplied the missing date. “That’s the day my mother gave birth to me and the day she died. On Halloween. What’s the matter, Raoul? What’s wrong?” Raoul’s eyes were wide, although Alexx couldn’t read them clearly,
couldn’t tell which was the overriding emotion—incredulity, amazement, disbelief, fear.
“That’s the day Jamie died,” he said at last, and they simply stared at one another, as the implications began to sink in.
“I don’t believe in what you’re suggesting,” Raoul said bluntly.
“What do you think I’m suggesting?”
“Reincarnation.”
“I never said anything about reincarnation.”
“What else can it be?”
They stared at one another, barely breathing. Alexx broke the silence first. “It’s just a coincidence.”
Raoul nodded. “Has to be.”
“Me being born on the day he died.”
“I agree.”
They laughed together, hearts in sync once more. The momentary tension was relieved. Reluctantly, they sat up, stretched cramped muscles, and reached for scattered articles of
clothing. They pulled everything on, brushed off the sand that clung in damp clumps. Once they were reassembled, standing together beneath the moon’s nonjudgmental gaze, they cast a critical eye upon one another. Definitely not as dapper as when they’d started the evening.
“I’m guessing dinner’s not happening. At least not tonight,”
Alexx commented.
“Definitely not tonight. I’m sure my parents have long ago given up on us and eaten. At least I hope so.”
“Think we should call them and explain?”
Raoul gave him an are you kidding look.
“I guess that means no.” Alexx chuckled.
“You guess correctly.” Raoul pulled Alexx to him, his hands running down his back and over his ass in a thoroughly possessive gesture. “Besides, I still have a business to run. I need to go to Charisma and see what’s going on there. We can clean up at the club and order something in. Sorry about the chateaubriand. We’ll go back another time.”