Another picture back, stroking faster. He pulled himself fully out of his sweats and boxers so he had more room. Precum slicked his movements as he traced fantasized patterns around Jake’s freckles, imagined the soft brush of blond hair falling around his cheeks.
Heat burned up from Quinn’s balls, filling him with licking, dancing flames, all the way to his head. The heat forced his mouth open, but instead of breathing fire, a strangled groan flew out as his cock throbbed, spurting white up into the air, onto his shirt, into his bush, on his thighs. The orgasm vibrated through him, clenching and releasing his muscles over and over. His stomach and chest heaved with each breath and he got lightheaded, having to set his phone down to avoid the risk of dropping it.
After a minute or two, he got up on shaky legs and stumbled to the bathroom to rinse off. When he got out, his phone still had Jake’s picture on it, and unlike with porn, he didn’t immediately want to close it. Absolutely zero post-nut guilt setting in.
Can I really do this temporarily with him?Quinn sat back on the couch and turned on the TV, then grabbed his normal, familiar controller. Jake’s was still hooked up, and he didn’t intend to unhook or put it away or anything. Some part of him felt like he should keep it hooked up. A show of good faith. Just in case.
And he knew, as hard as it might end up being to keep things between himself and Jake temporary, it would be a hell of a lot harder to cut that contact back again after breaking the seal.
Chapter sixteen
Jake
Eliza pointed to Jake,signaling him to start his confessional over again. He patted the hanging kitchen shelf he’d just wrapped construction on. “Storage is always a big deal, especially in the kitchen. So Evander and I worked together to come up with this design to make up for the hanging cabinets we had to take out when we opened up the kitchen.” He pointed with his carpenter’s pencil, tracing the air above each section as he gave commentary. “Nothing too crazy. Some polished brass struts to hold everything together, keeps things light enough without sacrificing too much structural integrity. Then some light oak on the shelves. Those just got a polyurethane finish to protect them. It’s food safe and lets the wood’s natural beauty shine through.” He brought the pencil down and followed the rounded edge. “Put a bullnose all the way around, and smoothed out the corners to keep things looking a little less severe.”
Eliza nodded. “Are you still good putting the plan for this up on the website?”
“Absolutely.” He nodded, took a beat, then went back in. “If you want to build a shelf like this for yourself, I’ve put the plans up on the Pine Point Fixer Uppers website, and I’ll have a tutorial up on our VideoHead channel walking you through the whole construction.” That had been Mason’s idea whole cloth, but everyone jumped on it. A great way to get more income in through the channel—they’d negotiated a sixty-forty split with Homescapes, amidst much grumbling from Aras and Ozzy—and to help boost up the visibility of the show. Plus it would help people out if they wanted to try and tackle a project on their own. There was no way they could help everyone who needed a hand in their house, but this was at leastsomething. They’d help whoever they could.
“All right, I think that should get the job done.” Eliza looked over something on her tablet, then smiled at Jake. “Footage is good, and we can ADR if we need anything different with the audio.”
“Groovy.” Jake patted the shelving unit, then backed away as two of Linda’s workers grabbed it and took it inside to be hung up. They’d gotten the base cabinets in the day before, and the quartz countertops were due at the end of the week. This shelf would make it feel a hell of a lot more complete.
The laundry room shelf had been easy enough to finish once he got the lumber ripped down to the right sizes. He had to go with thin stuff, but it would have been wasteful to go buy more when they had so much scrap still to work through. A little wood glue and some finishing nails, then putty on the joints and holes and it looked damn good, if he said so himself.
Finishing that also freed him up to get started on the gaming room, which buoyed up his chest. He had so many plans for it, in his head and on paper, that he needed to still himself a littlebefore he started in so he could approach it with a level head, so he walked to the trailers to grab a snack and some extra water. He snagged some apple slices and refilled his bottle from the big cooler, then sighed and turned to look at the house.
His phone buzzed and he pulled it out to check. When he saw Quinn’s number, he smiled and opened the message.
Hey. What’s protocol on me coming over to the house?
I’ve always been scheduled to come out before.
Give me a second. I’ll check.
It would sit off with Jake if he had to tell the homeowner he couldn’t come out, but this was a production and he wasn’t in charge. He headed into hair and makeup and waved down Corinne, one of the hair stylists. “Hey, could you get Eliza over here? Nothing major, just a logistics question from Quinn.”
“Of course.” She raised up her walkie and spoke into it. “Eliza to hair and makeup when you get a minute.”
Jake saluted her, then walked back out to stand by the craft services table. When Eliza got within eyesight, he waved her down. “Hey, sorry. I had Corinne ping you for me.”
“No problem.” She shifted her path and walked up to him, grabbing a croissant from the table. “What’s going on?”
“Quinn wants to know if he’s allowed to come to the house. I don’t know how you want to play that from your side.”
“Standard practice with Homescapes is, whoever we’re doing the job for can come whenever they want, up to the point where we start staging and doing final touches. Usually about the last three or four days of the job.” She took a bite and spoke aroundthe mouthful of croissant. “Keep the final house a secret for the big reveal.”
“Cool. I’ll let him know.” And he did, just a quick message, which got a thumbs up in return. He waved at Eliza as he headed back for the tent, chomping down on the apple slices and thinking through where to start on all the built-ins for the gaming room.
Shouting from inside drew his attention away. A lot of shouting, and it didn’t sound like a celebration of any kind. He jogged across the porch and through the front door to see the commotion.
The shelf they’d brought in, the one they’d just filmed the segment on, was on the floor. No damage to that, but some red speckles dotted the floor and the shelves and the cupboards.
Mason grabbed the side of his head, staring at the floor, and the shouting had quickly gone quiet, the whole space still. No one was angry, it seemed, but he could piece together what happened easily enough. A relatively lightweight shelf like that was still heavy when it fell on your head.
He marched over. “Mason, you good?”
“Fuck. Yeah. I think. Head wounds bleed more than they should, right?”
