Dark Soul Vol. 4 (7 page)

They are cops. Once they’ve shot their load, they can think again.

Think,
Silvio!”

Silvio blinked. Once, then lowered his gaze. “All I want from you is . . .”

Silvio wants to belong.

“Sex?” Stefano moved even closer, so close he brushed against Silvio’s body. He’d bet his car that Silvio was rock-hard in his leather racing suit. “You want my dick up your ass while I strangle you breathless. Right now? Here?”

“ . . . Yeah.” Barely audible.

Damn. And his body agreed that was the best idea he’d had all day, too. “You got any lube or condoms on you?”

Silvio flashed his teeth in a grin. “No.”

Cal ing the porter for that was completely out of the question.

Did drug stores do express deliveries? Stefano let Silvio go, tried to compose himself, which meant stepping out of that magnetic field.

“We can use spit.”

“Doesn’t solve the condom problem.”

“No problem for me.”

“Silvio, I’m married. I’m not putting my wife at risk for . . .”
A
cheap thrill.

“A dirty AIDS-ridden homo ass?” Silvio bristled.

“
Fuck’s sake
.” Stefano balled his fists and forced himself to let that tension go before he strangled Silvio for real this time. “If I’m going to be the cheating asshole, at least I don’t want to put anybody’s health at risk, okay? Not yours, mine, or Donata’s.”
If she’ll ever take
me back.
But that was exactly the kind of thought that helped his body come down from that sudden spike of arousal. He’d grown up with those stories, of cheating husbands infecting their wives. Hell, didn’t even have to be HIV—plenty of other nasties Mother Nature had cooked up. “That includes you, Silvio. It’s bad enough you go out and kill people; why do you insist on picking up every fucking risk that you run into?”

Silvio blew out a breath. “I’m on edge, too.”

“Makes two of us, yeah.” Stefano grabbed his jacket. “I’ll just get some supplies. Was that drug store left or right?”

“Down the way we came.” Silvio sat down and placed his feet on the coffee table. “Sure you don’t want me to come along?”

“It’ll be five minutes.”

“I’m not armed anyway. Great asset I’d be as a bodyguard now.”

Silvio sounded grouchy, which made Stefano smile. Damn, those sudden shifts would end up giving him emotional whiplash. As if Silvio needed a gun to be dangerous, or protective like a bodyguard.

He was the kind of man who tore lives apart as easily as he put himself up to be torn apart for someone he’d sworn loyalty to. How had Falchi ever dealt with this? Who’d give him the wisdom to handle Silvio without losing his mind in addition to his heart?

That he was thirty-three and wearing a tailored suit and an eight-thousand-dol ar wristwatch didn’t change the fact that Stefano felt just like he had at sixteen, buying his first pack of condoms. As if the underpaid woman at the till gave a fuck what exactly he was going to do with the “extra strong” condoms that were “suitable for anal sex.”

Just because they were “suitable” didn’t mean that was what he would use them for. Of course, the “personal lubricant” gave it away. Then again, even heterosexual men had anal sex—just the
combination
of condoms and lube didn’t make him look gay, did it?

She’d sooner catch on that he was a cheater if he didn’t manage to hide the fact that he was flustered. All this had been an awful idea.

But it was this or just walk away from it al . A cheater
and
a coward.

But the woman didn’t blink or otherwise acknowledge his choices, so he paid and returned as nonchalantly as he could to the hotel suite. He made sure the door was locked and kept himself from moving some heavy piece of furniture against it.

Silvio had left his leather suit in the living room. On it, in a little pile, was a pair of well-worn jeans that looked like somebody had shot at them (nice self-ironic touch in choice of designer), one of his tight running tops, and socks. Calvin Kleins.
Of course; is there anything
gayer than that?

Just as Stefano was taking the supplies out of the bag, the skin at the back of his neck pricked. He turned.

Silvio was standing there, materialized like a ghost, dressed in a white oversized bathrobe he could have wrapped three times around himself. Just the sheen of water on his neck was enough to make the embarrassment of the condoms-and-lube quest worthwhile.

Silvio glanced at the package. “Going to hole up here for a week?”

“The big pack was on sale.”

“Whatever.” Silvio grinned. “I’m game.”

Good God, and the charge was back, full force.

Stefano took off his jacket. He’d just begun unbuttoning his shirt when Silvio moved in front of him and took over the task. He didn’t seem to look at his fingers at al , navigating Stefano’s shirt with a confidence that some people might have found unnerving.

Stefano met the dark gaze and couldn’t help but think that Silvio had been testing him all along. The killer had surely pressed all his buttons, from tenderness to rage, from knowledge to guilt. It was like Silvio had examined and explored
him
now, just as he had physically explored Silvio’s body under the shower that day. Maybe that was where their respective weaknesses lay. He had no clue how to make love to a man, and Silvio’s command and understanding of human emotions . . . seemed somewhat lacking.

What a fucking pair we are,
Stefano thought when Silvio pulled his undershirt over his head.

Stefano reached for the belt that held Silvio’s bathrobe, and pulled it open, then brushed the heavy cloth off Silvio’s shoulders.

Naked, Silvio was breathtaking, from the tight, clean shave to the groomed and perfect fingernails; every line of his body, every carefully arranged little detail, tattoo, scar, long legs and high, tiny ass. No second thoughts, though. Donata knew anyway. He’d have to make amends, apologize, find a solution to all this. But if he was going to be punished for it, he might just as well take what he needed beforehand.

“What will this mean, Silvio?”

“We can just fuck, doesn’t have to mean anything,” Silvio murmured, opening Stefano’s belt.

“Do you value yourself so little?”

“No, but it doesn’t have to be so complicated. It doesn’t have to mean anything beyond what we’re doing.” Silvio knelt down and slipped off Stefano’s shoes and socks. Being undressed by a naked man was weird, thrilling, and so intimate it made Silvio’s words sound like a lie.

“But what if it could?”

Silvio gave him an empty stare, either not comprehending, or guarding himself incredibly well. It all became moot when he rubbed his face against Stefano’s groin, the gesture of an animal.

We’re just what we do, not what we feel.
Tempting. Have it all without any further entanglements. If anybody could show him how to do that, it was Silvio, who’d surely invented no-strings-attached sex.

He pulled Silvio up by the shoulder and kissed him, just long enough to psych himself up further. “Let’s go to the bedroom.”

“Mine or yours?” Silvio asked, grinning, but obeyed Stefano’s nod toward the nearest one. He only stopped to pick up the lube and pack of condoms.

In the room, Stefano attempted to close the door behind them, but Silvio shook his head. “Just like to have that line of sight open.”

The words brought back all kinds of danger: Russians, exposure, even the Goddamned room service.

Silvio sat down on the bed, opened the box of condoms and pulled a strip of three out, placed them strategically. “Come here.”

Stefano sat next to him, unsure of what to do next, and he didn’t like that. “Anything I should keep in mind?”

Silvio nodded. “Yeah. Enjoy yourself. It’s not hard.” Then Silvio kissed him, and things got easier. He touched that shower-warm skin, thrilled when Silvio groaned into the kiss.

Suddenly he couldn’t touch him enough, all that smooth muscle, breathing, living, and clearly desiring him. Silvio knew no limits, no hesitations. Just feeling him move against him, feeling Silvio’s hard dick rub against him, feeling Silvio’s hands slide and knead and every shift in the kisses made everything possible.

Above al , he wasn’t hurting any longer; he could actually breathe and move too, feel alive and not as brittle and scared as he had been.

Silvio brought it back, that huge lesson. He’d survived, they both had, and as short and nasty as life was, it would be as worthwhile as they could make it.

Stefano pushed, and Silvio let him roll on top, held onto him with one hand and stroked his dick with the other. Legs open, inviting him. Stefano deepened his kiss, covered Silvio’s nose with one hand and blocked half his view, too, then delved deep with his tongue. Silvio’s response was not about fighting him off but luring him deeper in. He was well and truly lost.

“Don’t move,” he whispered to Silvio, and slid down his body, tracing the lines of his muscles with his tongue, sucking and then biting one of the nipples. Silvio gasped, but reached behind himself, stretched out as if he were tied to the bed. As restless as he was, actually tying him down would be the closest thing to torture, but while Stefano was all right with interrupting this for condoms and lube, he wasn’t going to stop to find some kind of rope now. Maybe next time.

He bit down harder on the nub, and noticed that the pain did absolutely nothing to deflate Silvio’s erection. He added a bite to the other side, just for balance, not
at all
to see Silvio squirm. “Do you like nipple clamps?”

“Yeah . . .” Silvio grinned. “Biting works, though.” He opened his legs further, glanced meaningfully at the lube, but Stefano pretended he hadn’t seen that. Later. He kissed down to the “
anima nera”

tattooed across Silvio’s chest, feeling both the beating of his heart and the short, hard breaths that tightened the muscles further down. He struggled to not be hypnotized by the pattern.

Silvio seemed way too precious now to leave him to any stranger, let alone two or four, or anybody else. If he’d been able to, he’d have washed the traces of every touch away, washed away all blood and sweat and whatever else had touched Silvio’s skin. Carved all hurt, pain, resentment, disappointment, and failure out of his soul and burned it. Still, with everything Silvio had gone through, right now the man was his, breathing like this because of how Stefano kissed him, touched him. Inviting
him
, nobody else, not Gianbattista Falchi, not a stranger, to open him up and fuck him.

Stefano glanced further down, but it wasn’t that weird when he kissed Silvio’s dick. Chaste, because, Goddamn, enormous step toward gay, but he kissed it again, the length, the shaft, found the thought was bigger than the action.

Silvio followed his gaze down and touched his cheek, thumb brushing his lips. It was certainly easier to suck on Silvio’s thumb than open his mouth for his cock.

Cocksucker.

How one word, one insult traded so casually could make this so difficult, even with Silvio.

Silvio grinned at him. “Yeah, that part is pretty damn gay, right?”

He gasped, though, when Stefano squeezed his balls.

“It is,” Stefano replied, moving away to kiss Silvio’s thigh. Much safer territory. He did enjoy going down on Donata—but this would need work. Huge amounts of work.

He pulled the lube closer. Kneeling on the bed, he opened the hard-won tube and squeezed some into his palm, then warmed it between his hands before he took hold of Silvio’s cock, pumping him slowly, which wasn’t that different to what he knew already.

Silvio watched him for a bit, then closed his eyes, pushing up a bit against every stroke. By the blank concentration on his face, he was enjoying himself nicely, and more when Stefano added a little twist just under the head. “D-do whatever you like,” Silvio panted. “I’m just bad with getting tied up. Need . . . to get into that . . . headspace.”

“I tied you up that first night.”

Silvio grinned. “I was in that . . . headspace.”

“I’ll remember that. How do I get you back there?”

“Trust thing,” Silvio said, thrusting harder. “Cane me, whip me, do whatever, but easy with . . . the ropes.”

The answer didn’t make any sense. How could Silvio have trusted him that first night? And why not now, weeks and months later, after everything that had happened, all the stuff they’d gone through? All the glimpses of knowledge, of maybe even understanding, seemingly hadn’t changed a thing.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but it was hard to be sure about anything with Silvio laid out before him, begging and needy.

Stefano swallowed dryly, thinking of Silvio stretched out and tied up.

Sexy as hell, but he himself would never allow that to be done to him, and he didn’t want to imagine why Silvio drew a line there. Was it that he was still a control freak? Was it a bad experience? He jerked Silvio harder, until Silvio shook his head. “Slow. I want to last.”

Really, already? He had to be doing something right. “How do you want it?”

“Right now.” Silvio grinned at him and turned around to get on his knees, legs wide open. “Get the condom on.”

Stefano wiped his hands and reached for the strip, tore the first one open. He positioned it with a great deal of care, pushing away every thought of what he was about to do. Just another step.

He ran his hand down Silvio’s back, just moments away from fulfilling what he’d fantasized about since that first night. He reached again for the lube, lubed his dick, then wiped his hand in Silvio’s crack.

“Just put it in,” Silvio ordered and lowered himself on his elbows, again the shameless animal.

Stefano was past caring. He moved up against Silvio’s ass and positioned his dick and held it in place while he moved a bit forward, just a little, from the hip. The tightness was a huge, hot rush through his body, and he pushed further, feeling Silvio yield to him easily, his breaths closer to panting.