Darwin’s words, so thick and hot, whispered right in his ear, pulled the sound out of Tom.
The panic, usually so all-consuming, seemed like a minor annoyance now, with Darwin’s hot hands still holding Tom’s head and the roughly whispered words brushing his ear.
“Yes.” Tom barely realized the strangled-sounding word came from his own throat.
“Yes to what?” Darwin pushed, his fingers kneading Tom’s scalp.
It didn’t feel as if there was enough oxygen in the bowling alley for Tom to talk and
survive. Darwin was waiting for an answer though, so Tom sucked in a deep, wavering breath and spoke.
“Afterward.”
How could he have ever thought he could live without Tom? Darwin tried to bring himself back under control but that one simple word from Tom’s lips almost brought him to his knees.
“Let’s go,” he said, knowing his voice sounded harsh but not able to help it. It was all he could do not to throw Tom over his shoulder and make a dash for the truck.
Tom was silent as they changed their shoes and pulled on their coats. He shoved open the door and held it for the man, the wind trying to grab it out of his fingers.
Once they were outside, Tom stopped several feet from where their trucks were parked. Theirs were the only two vehicles on the lot besides a multicolored beater in the far corner, which Darwin assumed was the bored clerk’s car.
The scent of fear was dominating again.
In the bowling alley, fear and lust had vied for position, but now Darwin could barely make out a trace of Tom’s desire. He closed his eyes, shoving away the bitter disappointment and frustration.
“You know you can always change your mind.”
Tom shot him a quick look before shaking his head. “I haven’t. At least, I mean, about the afterward.” He looked back at the two pickups. “It’s just the
ride
to the afterward. Getting into your pickup with you… I just…I don’t think I can do it.”
Jamming his hands in his pockets, Tom stared across the parking lot. “It isn’t that I don’t trust you, really. I’m just an idiot.”
With renewed hope sparking in his belly, Darwin walked over to stand in front of Tom. “So do you want to follow me to my place or should I follow you to yours?”
Tom met his gaze, those Bambi eyes surprised. “Yeah?” he asked, the beginning of a smile putting a faint dent in his cheek.
Darwin resisted the urge to kiss that dimple.
“You don’t mind?”
“’Course not,” Darwin scoffed, and then gave in to the urge to brush his lips against the other man’s cheek. “Your house, then?”
Tom shook his head. “Yours.”
*
The entire drive to his cabin, Darwin kept checking his rearview mirror, surprised each time he saw Tom’s headlights glowing behind him. At every possible turnoff, Darwin expected the other man to bail, to whip around and peel away, squealing tires and flinging gravel in his hurry to escape.
It never happened, though, even as they turned onto Darwin’s twisting driveway.
Tom’s pickup pulled up next to his in front of the machine shed Darwin used for a garage. Hopping out of his truck, Darwin hurried around to stand next to Tom’s door.
Tom was still sitting in the driver’s seat, staring straight ahead, his hands strangling the steering wheel.
“Shit,” Darwin muttered under his breath. He had known this was too good to be true. His stomach falling in disappointment, he tapped gently on the glass. Tom didn’t turn his head. In the glow of the sodium security lights, his skin looked greenish-pale.
“Oh well,” Darwin said under his breath.
“Baby steps, I guess.” After eyeing the other man’s obviously terrified expression, Darwin leaned closer, squashing his nose against the glass.
Tom darted a quick look at the window, which turned into a stare. Darwin crossed his eyes and made his mouth do fish-looking things. Since all he could see with his eyes crossed was the squished end of his own nose, Darwin jumped at the sound of Tom’s breathless laugh. Darwin pulled his face off the window as Tom lowered the glass.
Tom opened his mouth to talk, but Darwin jumped in before he could let any words escape. “I was going to tell you how honored you should be.”
Blinking, Tom just repeated, “Honored?”
Happy he’d distracted Tom from whatever apology he’d been about to give, Darwin nodded vigorously. He knew the night was most likely not going to end in mutual same-room nakedness, but he still didn’t want to hear the words out loud and definite. If he could delay the final rejection with babble, then babble he would.
“Honored. The second I get home, I always open the shed and put my truck inside.
Tonight though, I wasn’t really thinking about the truck.”
“I’m sor—”
Darwin cut him off with a shake of his head and a smile. “I’m not. The truck’ll get over it. Plus, I had the anticipation of the drive home.”
Tom stared at him with those tragic eyes.
“Why couldn’t I have met you before I got so fucked-up?”
“Just think,” Darwin said, “how amazing it’s going to be when we finally do it…when we’re both in the same room, I mean.”
A twitch of a smile tugged at Tom’s mouth. “Did you just say ‘do it’? Are you twelve?”
Rolling his eyes, Darwin gave a mock-exasperated sigh. In reality, he was happy to see color coming back into Tom’s face.
Especially when that color wasn’t green.
“Fine. When we knock boots. When we bump uglies. When our souls become one.
When—”
“We do the nasty,” Tom interrupted.
“Sexercise.”
“Dip the wick.”
Darwin grinned at him. “When we make magical, mystical love.”
“Do the horizontal mambo.”
“It could be vertical,” Darwin corrected.
Tom shrugged, even more color coming into his cheeks. “Perform sodomy, then.”
“Is it wrong that you saying that turned me on?”
Choking on a laugh, Tom blushed even brighter. “It’s your namesake. You like those scientific terms.”
“You got it.” Darwin leaned his hip against the truck. “If you really want to get me excited, you should read the sexual intercourse chapter from a medical textbook out loud.”
Squishing up his face, Tom shook his head. “Those chapters always have the STD
info in them. Kind of a mood-killer for me.”
Darwin raised an eyebrow. “Read a lot of sex chapters from medical texts, do you?”
“Where else could a thirteen-year-old kid find pictures of naked men?”
“Uh…the internet?” Darwin guessed, shifting his weight so he could prop his crossed arms against the bottom of the truck’s open window.
“Nope.” Tom shook his head. “Back then, my family still had dial-up. Pictures took so long to load that my mom or Anne would walk in before I got to see anything below his bellybutton.”
Darwin snorted, amused.
“Why? What’d
you
use for porn as a horny teen?”
The question stopped Darwin’s laughter.
It was so easy to talk to Tom that he sometimes forgot to steer the conversation away from awkward topics, such as family or growing up or any memories of his life before the lab—or anything about the lab at all.
“I’m sure I found something,” he non-answered, dropping his gaze. “So what do you think?”
“About porn?” Tom’s voice was amused.
Darwin looked up at him and grinned.
“Think I can guess what you think about porn,” Darwin said dryly. “I meant, do you think you want to stay or do you need to go?”
The scent of Tom’s nerves filled the space in the truck cab and Darwin realized he was leaning in closer. Tom’s fear and desire seemed to go hand in hand, until a whiff of either one was enough to make the blood rush faster through Darwin’s body.
“I don’t…ah…”
Now Tom was chewing on the inside of his bottom lip. This was another thing that drove Darwin wild. He held back a snort.
Tom could do anything and it would drive him wild.
Tom
drove him wild.
Leaning through the window, he let his lips brush against Tom’s jaw. The other man froze beneath the touch.
“It’s okay,” Darwin said, starting to retreat a few inches, but Tom grabbed his coat right beneath the collar, holding him still.
“I don’t want to leave.” Tom rushed out the words, his cheeks red, his gaze fixed somewhere in the region of Darwin’s chin.
It was hard finding enough oxygen to speak. “So don’t.” The words came out in a growl but it was the best Darwin could do with Tom just inches away, clinging to his coat, the quick puffs of his breath warming Darwin’s throat.
Tom gave a strangled laugh. “I can’t get out of the truck.”
“So don’t.” He couldn’t hold still any longer. Closing the distance between them, Darwin touched the edge of Tom’s cheekbone with his lips. This close, the smells and sounds and feel of Tom made Darwin drunk. He trailed his mouth over the bridge of Tom’s nose and kissed his other cheekbone on the way to his ear.
Using his teeth, Darwin tugged at the lobe. At the sound of Tom’s gasp, Darwin reached for him, threading his fingers through his hair and tilting Tom’s head back to give himself better access to the vulnerable line of his neck.
“Please,” Tom groaned—at least Darwin thought that was the translation of the guttural sound dragged out of his throat.
“Please more?” Darwin licked a line up Tom’s throat, stopping right below his chin.
“Or please stop?”
From the way Tom was squirming to get closer, Darwin was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be the latter. Tom’s frantic headshake confirmed it.
“Don’t stop,” Tom ordered, tugging on Darwin’s coat. “Please kiss me.”
The way Tom said the words, as if he had to force them out through a sheer act of will, needing Darwin’s lips on his with such desperation that he could plow through his fear and hesitation, sent a renewed surge of desire through Darwin. Hisfingers tightened in Tom’s hair.
“I could never say no to you,” Darwin rasped, and then found the other man’s mouth with his own. Heat flared as soon as their lips touched. Darwin wanted to be gentle, to go slowly, but his self-control shredded at the feel of Tom’s mouth. He leaned farther into the vehicle and took over the kiss, his lips and tongue insistent.
In the back of his mind, Darwin worried that Tom would panic and try to pull away.
At this moment, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to let the other man go. Instead, though, Tom leaned into the kiss, responding as eagerly as Darwin.
Darwin’s brain flooded with lust and he grabbed both of Tom’s arms. Without breaking the kiss, he tried to pull the other man through the open window.
Tom yelped, “Seat belt!”
Releasing his grip, Darwin jumped back, smacking his skull against the top of the window on his way out. “Shit! I’m sorry.”
As the cloud of desire cleared from his mind and the pain from the impact faded a little, he moved back toward Tom.
“Okay?” he asked, his voice still growly as his gaze scanned the other man for damage.
“Hang on.”
Darwin heard the click of the seat belt releasing and then Tom reached through the window. There was a wicked grin on his face. It looked good on him, Darwin decided, as he grasped the other man’s arms and pulled him out of the truck through the window.
“Does this make me Bo or Luke?” Tom asked as regained his feet outside the truck, holding on to Darwin’s arms while he found his balance.
Darwin laughed. “Or Daisy?” He ducked as Tom swung a fist at his head. “Sorry, sorry! You’re definitely Luke.”
“And you’re freakishly strong,” Tom said, glancing back at the truck. “I thought I’d come out that window and land on my face, but you basically lifted me out of there.”
Shifting his weight, Darwin asked, “Why exactly did you decide to do it
Dukes of Hazzard
style anyway? Something wrong with your door?”
Tom shrugged. “Wasn’t having much luck getting myself to open the door, so I figured what the hell. Might as well try the window.”
Laughing again, Darwin tossed an arm over Tom’s shoulders and turned him toward the cabin. “So does this mean you want to come in for a little while?”
To Darwin’s surprise, Tom walked with him willingly enough.
“Yeah,” Tom eventually answered.
Glancing at the other man’s face, Darwin asked, “Sure?”
“’Course not.”
Guilt fought with desire inside Darwin for a moment, before he reluctantly said, “You know you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do, right?”
Tom’s laugh startled him. “If I waited until I was sure, we’d both be a hundred years old and I’d be trying to hook up with you at the nursing home.”
Smiling at the image, Darwin gave him a sideways hug and hesitated in front of the door. “I don’t want you to be scared.”
With a snort, Tom said, “I
am
scared.
Shitless, actually. I just want
you
more than I want to run away.”
“That,” Darwin murmured, cupping Tom’s face in his hands and tilting it so he could look directly into the other man’s eyes, “is the hottest thing I can remember anyone ever saying to me.”
Tom dropped his gaze. “
You’re
the hottest thing I’ve ever seen,” he countered, stumbling just slightly over the words.
Darwin could feel the other man’s cheeks heat against his palms. “Sweet,” he breathed, and leaned in to kiss Tom. He intended it to be gentle but the instant their lips touched, his control slipped. Blood rushed through him, turning him deaf and blind and oblivious to everything except the beautiful man trembling against him.
He took over, his mouth urgent, his tongue insistent. Darwin started to shove Tom against the door but remembered just in time that a body slam was probably a bad idea. Instead, he spun around, letting his own back hit his front door. Without breaking the kiss, he pressed in the passcode on the keypad lock to the left of the doorframe by feel and shoved open the door.
They tumbled inside, Darwin almost falling on his ass, his usual coordination gone. His head was spinning as the taste and smell of Tom overtook him. He caught his balance and pulled Tom closer, as desperate as an addict. The kisses were frantic, technique forgotten, just needy and raw and as hot as fire.