STORY EXCERPT

“Did that motherfucker hit you?”

Cole Kowalski ducked his head, turning away from Adam's angry, accusing dark eyes.

Like that would be enough, he'd known it wouldn't be, so he didn't know why he'd tried to hide the black eye that was very clearly on his face.

“It doesn't hurt, and he didn't get me that bad—”

“Don't make excuses for him!” Adam snapped.

Cole flinched, and he still couldn't bring himself to look the other man in the face. All he could do was look down at Adam's boots, and the wooden floorboards of his porch. Cole shook his head, his heart drumming in his ears as anxiety spiked and was the only sound he could hear in his brain.

“I'm sorry, I really shouldn't have come here,” he said, grabbing onto his bag from where he'd dropped it on the porch. “This was a bad idea, I'll get out of here.”

Out of here was the only place he wanted to be, and in that moment, he was insanely desperate to get there.

Adam grabbed his other wrist, stopping him. Cole's entire body tensed, and he couldn't shake it off.

That tight grip, the feeling of being held back. He didn't like it.

“Let go, Adam,” he said.

Adam didn't let him go. He stepped out of his door and moved in front of Cole. Cole looked up into his eyes before recalling how bad he looked, and then glanced back down at his feet.

Adam's boots were incredibly close to the sneakers Cole wore.So was his chest.

Adam's hand, his rough, calloused fingers, came up and took hold of Cole's chin.

Cole let out a tiny gasp without really meaning to. He couldn't bring himself to glance up, but he didn't have much of a choice when Adam tilted his chin up, forcing him to look Adam in the face.

“I'm not going to hurt you,” he said, staring at Cole now.

Not into his eyes or anything. That would've been too much like a romance novel, and for that, Cole was incredibly disappointed. He would've loved for Adam to be looking him dreamily into the eyes right about now, hell, he was pretty sure it was exactly what he needed. Or the thing that would destroy him after everything he'd just been though with Marco.

Adam didn't read Cole's mind like he would've preffered. There was none of that spark or connection that Cole searched for, wished desperately to be there.

Adam seemed to be intently studying Cole's eye, and the bruise around it that had it nearly swollen shut just a couple of days ago.

“This is a couple of days old, isn't it?”

Cole felt that familiar shame rising up inside of him, and he hated it so damned much, wished there was something he could do about it, but there wasn't anything. He was stuck dealing with it.

He nodded all the same. “Yeah.”

Adam shook his head. “I'd hate to think about how bad it was the day after you got it.”

Pretty bad. Cole had to stop at a motel somewhere and rest the night because he'd had so much trouble driving his car down here. His head had ached and he could hardly see out of his right eye. On the highway, even a two lane highway that led to this tiny ass town, that wasn't exactly a good thing.

But then he'd been too scared out of his mind to stay in that motel for more than a couple of hours. He'd barely put his head down and slept before he shot awake and just had to get the hell out of there, driving until he'd made it to Adam's door.

He'd been so glad the man still lived here.

“Come on inside,” Adam said, turning around and moving toward the door. Because he'd refused to let go of Cole's hand, he ended up pulling the man inside with him.

Cole nearly faltered his step. “I, uh, are you sure. I mean I don't want to intrude—”

“You came all this way, you might as well come on in,” Adam said.

Cole tried to pretend that didn't just lance him through the heart with a rusty spear.

Could the man sound anymore unwelcome, or angry?

Cole couldn't help himself as he was pulled into Adam's house. His eyes started to wander.

A lot of it looked the same, but there were other noticeable differences. The lack of paintings his mother had done as a child, the missing furniture, and the genuine lack of a female touch.Cole had heard that Adam's mother had moved in with a brother after the death of his father, but somehow, Cole had expected nothing to have really changed. The place was clean, but it didn't feel the same.

It felt big and empty.

Weird. The ranch had always been full of people before.

Adam brought Cole into the dining room. The big table made of solid oak was still the same, and Cole couldn't help but smile at the sight of it.

“Sit there. I'll bring you something for your eye.”

“I've been putting cream on it,” Cole said.

“I'll put more on it,” Adam replied, and then turned and vanished.

Cole waited until the man was gone, and then released the biggest, heaviest sigh he'd let out ever since he'd snuck out of his apartment and hit the road.

That had been weirdly intense. Now that the intensity was done, the only thing Cole could do was sit there and look around at his surroundings, wondering what the hell he'd been thinking coming down here.

It had been nearly thirty hours’ worth of driving. Almost none stop, had it not been for that one stint in the motel and a couple of bathroom breaks, and now here he was.

He'd swore he'd never come back here, but after what happened, there was nowhere else to go.

ADULT EXCERPT

Their cocks touched, slid against each other, as if Adam was introducing them to each other for the first time. He got the stupid mental image in his head that they were shaking hands or something, and he nearly laughed at that.

Cole didn't seem to notice. His hands had moved away from Adam's happy trail and had moved up to his shoulders, gripping them tight and kissing Adam back. The man thrust his hips back against Adam's, softly sighing and moaning at the simple pleasure of it before he turned his face away from the kiss to suck in a breath.

The move exposed his throat, and Adam's mouth came down on it, attacking it and sucking on it, drawing more of those moans out of Cole's throat.

He tasted so damned good. He tasted like clean skin and everything Adam had been fantasizing about with his hand around his cock for the last two years. Longer than that, actually. The fantasies had just gotten worse, and a lot sadder, after Cole ran out of his life.

“Do you...” Cole panted for breath and swallowed. Adam kissed the man's Adam's apple. “Do you have anything we can use?”

Right, they needed some supplies to get this underway.

Despite Adam's heartbreak and loneliness after Cole had left, he hadn't exactly been chaste. He'd been with people and there were condoms and lube inside of his house.

Fuck, but getting them meant he had to get off of his new comfy spot and go looking for them.

Do the responsible thing. Ten seconds of no kissing and touching wouldn't hurt him. He'd gone pretty much his entire life without touching or kissing. Another couple of seconds wasn't going to hurt him.

His dick really didn't want Adam to pull away from what he was doing, however.

Fuck!

Adam pulled back, almost leaping right off the couch. “Be back in one second, sweetheart,” he said, and then started running for it before Cole could even reply.

The look of Cole's eager smile as Adam turned and ran, bare assed naked through his house to get what they needed to proceed, was burned into his brain.

Adam ran into his bathroom, the one next to his bedroom. He yanked open the medicine cabinet and started pulling out the things he would need for this to be a reality. He grabbed the entire boxy of condoms—a man could never be too prepared—and the lube before dashing back to the living room like he was the horniest roadrunner.

He might've even left a cloud of dust behind him.

When he got back, I’ll Be had ended on the radio, replaced with another romantic song from the nineties. Wonderwall by Oasis. Fuck, if this wasn’t some amazing sign then he didn’t know what was.

Cole was right where Adam had left him, the only difference was that the man had his hand around his cock, slowly pumping himself and humping into his fist.

Holy fuck, Adam moaned and his balls tightened at the sight. That was so fucking hot.

Even better than that was the sexy smile on Cole's face. The black eye, while still there, suddenly didn't seem to take up his entire face.

“You're not supposed to start without me,” Adam said, putting one knee down on the couch.

Cole faltered a bit before he resumed what he'd been doing. “What are you going to do about it?” His eyes moved to the box of condoms Adam had brought back with him. “You came prepared.”

“Always prepared. Have to be. It was the one good thing my father taught me to be.”

As much as he hated the old man sometimes for manipulating and influencing him, even after his death, he had to give the bastard that much credit.

The old man was probably turning over in his grave if he could see what his son was doing with that weird queer kid he'd distrusted so bad.

Good.

“Move your hand,” Adam said, gently pushing Cole's hand away from his cock, and then replacing it with his own.

Not just his hand either. Adam leaned down and opened his mouth, spreading his lips around the head and sinking down as far as he could take it.

Cole wasn't as thick as Adam was, but his cock was long. Long enough that there was no way in hell Adam would be able to deep throat him.

Cole didn't seem to have any complaints though. He let his head fall back, and sighed with his eyes screwed tightly shut. “Oh, fuck yeah,” he said, opening them back up so he could see what Adam was doing.

Adam stared back at him as he worked, wanting to see every expression on Cole's face, wanting to look at his pleasure while Adam worked him.

His cheeks were pink. Not just his cheeks either, the color had spread to his neck and ears. The man's pink nipples were hard and peaked. Adam couldn't resist them. They called out to him and he reached his hand up and tweaked the one on the far right, pinching it lightly between his fingers and making Cole sigh and buck. Then Adam did the same thing with the other one.

He felt every reaction from Cole on his fingertips and tongue. Every shiver, every ripple of goosebumps that forms over his body. It drove him wild. Without realizing it, Adam started thrusting his cock against Cole's leg, and some of the couch. He needed the friction. He needed it.

“Fuck, you're good at this. Ughhn! Adam, I'm gonna, fuck!”

That was all the warning Adam needed. He pulled his mouth away.

Cole's eyes sprung wide open before he stared down at Adam, mouth dropped in what could have been horror. “What are you doing?”

Adam grinned at him before reaching up and messing with his already messy strawberry blond hair. “Not yet. I want to feel your asshole clenching around my cock when you come.”