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“Donvino,” I opened with, pulling his gaze from my belly to my face. He spun from me, wine in hand, to go paw through the dishes piled in the sink. Sighing, I stepped closer, something that was easy to do as the place was so small you could cross it in twenty steps. Ten if you had long legs like the man twisting a corkscrew on the wine bottle. “I know that things have gotten weird between us…”
“Weird? No, it’s no weird.” The cork came free with a loud pop. He turned to face me, hurt deeply etched into his face. “You go off to Venice to be with Ricardo. That is what you should do, be with a man who is rich like you.” He took a drink, a long pull that emptied a good quarter of the bottle.
I reached up to jerk it from his lips. “Don’t be a hog.” I swilled back a quarter, swiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and then slammed the bottle to the counter with vigor. “Also, don’t be jumping to conclusions.”
“I’m not jumping to anything. I hear that you are there with him. He is good for you. He is what you need.”
“Okay, I am sick and tired of people telling me what is good for me!” I shouted so loudly he drew back in surprise. “My father tells me what to do, and my aunt, my tutor, even the damn cat has started bossing me around! Wake up and give me some salmon flakes, Arlo! Come pet me, Arlo! And okay, sure, I don’t mind Lucia being bossy because she is adorable but I really resent the rest of the world doing it so please stop saying Ricardo is the man I should be with when it should be pretty fucking obvious that I want to be here with you!”
I stood there panting, hands in fists at my sides, glowering up at the oaf. His shock shifted into something far softer, his eyes closing gently for a second, the tension in his wide shoulders leeching away. He mumbled something in Italian.
“You’re a dumb carrot?” I asked. He snorted once but then began to chuckle. The frustration chugged through my veins like a runaway train slowed, slowly being replaced with two emotions that were warring with each other to be top of the heap. Humor, because the man had an infectious laugh and desire because I wanted nothing more in the world than to climb him like the lemon trees in my great-aunt’s garden.
“Yes, I am a dumb carrot. The dumbest carrot in Italy.”
“Huh, I was right. I guess my lessons are paying off. Can I do something?”
“Sì, yes, of course.”
I launched myself at him, knowing he could catch me with ease. My mouth crashed over his, my tongue slipping in to taste the heady wine lingering on his tongue. His hands cradled my ass as I linked my ankles behind his lower back.
His tongue glided over mine, ramping up our passion, until he broke the kiss and eased me up to sit on his tiny slab of Formica. My spine shoved the coffeemaker into the wall. I chased his lips, but he was keeping a good foot between his lips and mine.
“We should finish our talk,” he said, his voice raspy with want. My cock wanted nothing to do with talking unless it was dirty talk. I doubted that was what Donvino had in mind, though. I kept touching him as he worked at gathering himself, stroking his stubbly cheeks, massaging his shoulders…anything to keep contact. “Both of us are bad at this thing.”
That pulled my attention to how lovely the skin over his collarbones was. “Bad?”
He nodded, not moving away but not easing closer. “Bad yes. I was jealous of Ricardo, so much so that I was willing to let him have you.”
“Excuse me, Signor Macho Man, but I decide who has me, not you, not some governmental heartthrob, not my aunt or my father or anyone else on the planet. Me.” I tapped my chest. “I decide, so you can stop trying to hand me off to some other guy like a prized goose. Capito?”
He smiled sheepishly. It was a good look for him. Then again, any expression was a good look on him.
“Yes, I understand.” He ducked his head for a moment, lifted it, and then cupped my face with a large hand, his thumb coming to rest on my lower lip. “I’ve never done this before.”
I placed my hand back on his chest, enjoying the feel of him under my finger pads. “Define this.”
“This for being with a man in more than a sneaky sexing up.” He rubbed his rough thumb over my lip. My dick was leaking into my briefs, the wet spot becoming larger with each passing moment. “I have hiding…been hiding being gay for so long. I am sorry for being so crazy in the head over things. I’ve never cared for a man so large before.”
I patted his pectorals, leaned in, and stole a gentle kiss. “I understand. And to be honest, I’ve never felt for a guy like I feel for you. I think I might have been acting clingy. Angry that you didn’t text me after you failed to qualify.”
“Uh, yes, that was unpleasant.” His eyes grew sad. “I so want to make my father proud, but I fail all the time. I’m not a good rower, I’m omosessuale. Gay, I am gay,” he clarified when I made a confused face. “I was sick at myself for being poor, for being queer, and so when I see you with Ricardo I feel sicker at myself, about myself, and then it goes worse. I am like a turtle Bianca says, when I suck my head then legs into my shell after making snapping faces at those who only want to feed me lettuce.”
“Oh you silly, sentimental turtle,” I cooed, letting my forehead come to rest on his chin for a moment as I parsed. “Okay,” I said, then lifted my head to stare into his deep brown gaze. “You have nothing to be jealous of when it comes to Ricardo. I do not want him, I want you, which is why I’m sitting here on your counter with a massive erection.” His eyes darted down to where my dick was trying to bust through my zipper. When his gaze returned from my crotch, his eyes were even hotter. “So, that’s that. No more worrying about the undersecretary. As for him having lots of cash and you having less, who cares?”
“I care, my family cares, everyone cares, Arlo.”
“Nope, not everyone. I don’t give two farts about money.” He cocked an eyebrow. “Okay, let me amend that.” I was sitting here in designer shorts, after all. “I do care, obviously, and I do like money, a lot. We all do, but a person having it or not, does not nor did it ever, figure into my attraction to a man. And now…well, now I don’t have any money either. I’m making working man wages for a year, then probably will be living on a meager stipend since I have no plans of running the fucking company. Dad and Aunt Ginerva can cut me off. I don’t care. I’ll move in here with you and we’ll make trunks! Yes, and when we’re selling scads of trunks, we’ll buy you a new scull and you can compete and make the Olympic team and all of our dreams will be fulfilled!”
He studied me intently, his expression inscrutable. “I’m not so sure about most of my dreams, Arlo, but there was one…I pray every day for a man to call my own.” My damn eyes welled up. “I dream of that, and maybe I think you are here for me.”
“I am, I am here for you to call your own!” I wiggled off the counter, back into his arms, linking my hands behind his neck and then levering my lips to his. The kiss was earth-shattering. “I’m not good at this either. I’m super possessive, it seems. I’m scared people will leave me, so I either shut them off or demand they’re always within reach so I can hold onto them so they cannot disappear.”
“We are big messes,” he whispered over my lips before claiming my mouth so deeply and thoroughly that I feared I might just pass out.
“The hugest messes. Please have patience with me. I promise I’ll try to be less…oh gods, that’s lovely,” I mewled as he nipped a line down my neck to a tender spot where my shoulder met my throat. He suckled a mark onto my flesh. I knew it…could feel the tenderness blossoming but didn’t give one shit. Nor did I care when he plunked me back on the counter, pulling free of my arms to peel my clothes off me. I wiggled free as best as I could to help him. My shirt flew over his head. A button on my shorts pinged off the old floral paper covering the kitchen walls. My underwear, sexy as it was, disappeared as if by magic. With a gentle nudge to my shoulder, I laid down, using my arms to clear whatever was on the counter to the floor save the coffeemaker. That I draped my leg over, opening myself up to his heated gaze.
“Are you hungry?” I asked as I took my cock in hand. “I have some meat for you,” I teased and gave my dick a tug.
