Tristan faced forward again, cheeks and ears bright scarlet. “Ta-dah.”
“Nice trick. I’d rather pay to see you undress than David Copperfield make a rabbit disappear.”
“Does David Copperfield do that?”
“Hell if I know.” Henry hesitated, then gingerly grasped Tristan’s shoulders. He ran his hands down hard, muscular arms and burn marks and another tattoo, this time of a poinsettia, which was faintly scribed a few inches above his left elbow. The ink was faded, barely red and barely green with a graying outline. Henry traced the outline of the petals with his thumb and stared straight into Tristan’s eyes. Unendingly dark and deep. They had their own gravity, begging Henry to come forward even as his stomach tightened around the thought of what he was doing, what he couldn’t keep from doing in that moment.
His lips pressed gently to Tristan’s. He stayed there with that barest contact, holding Tristan’s arms, waiting. A second. Two. Three.He’s not responding. It’s too much for him.Henry pulled away... and Tristan wrapped his arms around Henry’s middle so they were skin to skin, heartbeat against heartbeat. The tension wicked from Henry’s body as he leaned into Tristan’s embrace, relishing each point of contact.
Finally, Tristan leaned back in, made full lip contact. Henry let him control the pace, crackling with the thrill of the moment. Tristan, exposed, nervous, and still choosing him.
When Tristan finally broke away, he swallowed hard. His voice came out brittle. “I... Wow.”
“A closed-mouth kiss like I gave Samantha Nelson in sixth grade gets a wow?” Henry chuckled, and then drew in a lungful of Tristan’s warmth and sweat and the pervading smell of too much yeast and wheat and herbs that clung to his skin after so long working in the kitchen. Henry slid his hands back, clutching Tristan even closer: underwear to underwear, bulge to bulge. Tristan grew hard, and all Henry wanted was to strip him down and take him there against the counter. Legs in the air, dripping sweat, shower be damned.
But he pulled back. Tristan’s bodywasn’this. With whatever issues he had going on, Henry was going to be as careful as he could.
But hisownbody was his. He stood against the tub, hooked his thumbs into his waistband, and dropped his trunks. His cock sprung free and all the confidence in the world wasn’t keeping heat from rising up his chest and neck and face as Tristan took him in.
After a few seconds, Henry stepped backward into the shower. “You can join if you want. Or you can watch. Of course, if you don’t participate, you’ll have to put up with watching me jerk off.”
Tristan chewed on his lower lip, but didn’t step forward. “You don’t want to ask?”
“About what?” Henry let the steaming water pour over his hair, trickle hot down his spine. Nothing was doing a thing to get him softer, which was probably for the best. His physique was more impressive when he had a hard-on than when he didn’t, after all.
“Well... you know?” Tristan gestured to his chest, down his arms. “All this?”
“Oh. Yeah. Why a poinsettia? I mean, barbed-wire tramp stamp was probably a right-out-of-high-school decision, right? And the sugar skull because you’re a pastry chef and you’re proud of your heritage.” Henry cringed a bit at that. “Sorry. Guess I don’t even know what your heritage is. I bet your family’s from Allentown, PA or something like that and I look like an ass.”
Tristan shook his head, smiling. “First generation, actually. My parents lived in San Salvador when they were younger.”
Henry nodded, glad to have avoided that particular faux pas. He brushed soaked hair out of his face. “And the poinsettia?”
Tristan shrugged. “I think they’re pretty, and I like the story. Minus the Jesus stuff.”
“Well then, tell me the story, because I’m a clueless rube.”
Tristan chuckled, then dropped his boxers to the floor. His cock was impressive, with a rosy head and a thick, curving shaft that leaned to the left. Neatly trimmed bush of black curls. He didn’t have a bodybuilder V, but there were some noticeable sex lines running down from his abdomen. He stepped up and into the shower, then pulled the curtain around them. “You’re making a mess and you’re going to get the maids pissed off at me. Honestly.”
“Sorry.” Henry bent down and grabbed the tiny hotel shampoo from the corner of the tub. He scrubbed it through his hair, then turned in the too tight, too hot, too steamy confines of the shower. If they hadn’t been pressed together before, they certainly were now. “Story?”
“Yeah. Just let me have the water a second.”
Henry obliged, flattening himself against the wall as Tristan slipped past, his ass rubbing against Henry’s crotch.
“Poinsettia... a poor kid didn’t have anything to leave to honor Jesus at Christmas. So rather than leave nothing at all, he picked some weeds from the side of the road and left those. They sprung to life into beautiful red flowers. The poinsettia.”
“So it’s about transformation.” Henry couldn’t even make eye contact. There was something about a man under running water... and maybe specificallyTristanunder the pelting flow of the showerhead—hard-bodied, broad-shouldered, skin like fresh nutmeg. And goddamnthe things that man could do with chiffon cake. That was no small part of the overwhelming attraction.
Neither was his clear devotion to his sister.Nice to see a guy who cares about the world past the end of his own dick.
“It’s transformation, and about the power of belief. Again, not Jesus.” Tristan plucked the shampoo bottle from Henry’s grip, his touch lingering several seconds longer than necessary before taking it and popping the cap. “How if you really hold an idea in your heart, even the worst, most useless thing in the world can become special. It just needs enough love and affection to grow.”
Henry smiled and watched the suds wash their way down Tristan’s chest and shoulders. When he looked up, he fell toward the gravity of those eyes again until they pressed lips to lips. This time, Tristan’s mouth parted. His breath tasted of yeast and oil and flour, and his tongue pressed forward, hard and unrelenting. Henry could barely catch his own breath, and he relished every lightheaded second of the kiss, stretched it as long as he could stand it, because separating was unthinkable in that moment.
But eventually, he had to breathe, and he drew back enough to draw in oxygen. Tristan’s face was flushed, though from the kiss or the shower wasn’t clear. “What, I don’t get a wow from that?” Henry quirked up one corner of his mouth.
“If you need constant ego stroking, I don’t know how well this is going to work out. When you give away compliments, they lose all their meaning.”
