Holding Out for a Fairy Tale (16 page)

“I did,” said Elliot, stroking his finger back and forth, keeping the pleasure vibrating through Ray constant. “You were attentive. Considerate even. But judging the right angle based on a stranger’s reactions isn’t quite the same as knowing the right angle from personal experience. Maybe knowing how it feels, knowing what makes it so worthwhile, can change your point of view.”

Ray wasn’t sure how the hell Elliot expected him to pay attention with the constant pressure inside his body. He’d never felt anything like it, but everything from his balls to his gut tightened as the familiar tension of a hard orgasm began to build inside him. He couldn’t be that close. His cock was as hard as rock, straining against the waistband of his boxers, but it was completely neglected. He wanted to come, he was so damn close already, and he reached for his shorts desperately. Elliot moved in a flash, trapping his wrist before he could touch himself.

“I said don’t move.”

“But I….” Ray panted and bucked his hips up, trying to rub against Elliot’s body, trying to get even a bit of friction. Elliot kept stroking his finger inside Ray’s body. The individual shocks of pleasure merged into a constant hum that sent him crashing into a full orgasm, spilling inside his shorts, shaking all the way to his toes. Elliot’s finger drew out the aftershocks, reducing Ray to a quivering, tender heap beneath him.

Elliot slipped his finger out of Ray’s shorts and rolled off him. “Now imagine how my cock would feel doing that to you.”

Ray took a minute to catch his breath, to will some feeling back into his legs, then tried to answer. “Your cock?”

Elliot’s grin was evil as he nodded. “Bigger, thicker, longer….”

Ray swallowed hard. Elliot had just given him one of the strangest, fastest, hardest orgasms of his life—with a single finger inside him. He wasn’t sure he could imagine Elliot using something bigger right now.

“But, just a little advice, you need to work on your timing.”

“My timing?” Ray asked. His stamina was one of the few things he’d heard nothing but accolades about. He knew from direct experience that he could outlast Elliot.

“When you’re on top, you come first.”

“I always made sure you came first.” He loved watching Elliot come. The sight had driven him over the edge all by itself once.

Elliot sighed and leaned over Ray again. His hand went back up Ray’s shorts, and two fingers ghosted over his entrance. “Hey!” Ray flinched, curling his legs up, blocking Elliot’s access to the tender ring of muscle. The spot that drove him from mildly turned on to full-blown orgasm in about a minute was tender and still throbbing. Ray tried to imagine what it must have been like for Elliot, as he continued to pound into him afterward. Women never seemed to complain, and the men he’d been with since hadn’t either, but they usually went from meeting him thrust for thrust to just sitting there, taking it.

“See?”

Ray sat up, still trembling. The shame and embarrassment were mixed in equal parts—shame because he knew he’d probably hurt Elliot, embarrassed because he felt as if Elliot had made a fool out of him. But that wasn’t exactly fair. Elliot had tactfully not said anything while Ray made a fool out of himself. And now he was doing it again. Elliot had just given him one of the strongest orgasms he’d had in a long time, and instead of accepting the lesson, he was sitting there feeling resentful. “You should have said something. I like being able to get rough with guys, but I never meant to…. I’d have stopped.”

“I know.” Ray felt Elliot rub his back, up and down over his spine. “It’s not a big deal. Just a preference, that’s all. I really did have fun.”

Elliot’s hand on his back was warm and comforting, but Ray felt a tension in Elliot’s fingers that reminded him how unfair he was being. Ray turned his head over his shoulder and smiled down at Elliot. He was casually stroking himself, not hard enough to get off, but with smooth, languid motions.

“That was fun,” Ray admitted.

It was more than fun. It had shaken him to his core. And now he was just more confused about where they stood. He didn’t want to fuck things up again, but he had to show Elliot how good they could be together. He had to make the other man give him another one of those silent screams before he went droopy-eyed again. He wanted Elliot to want him, to need him the way Ray felt like he needed Elliot, to be so crazy with desire that he ended up just as fucked up as Ray was.

He didn’t hesitate. He ran his tongue up the length of Elliot’s shaft, circled the head twice, and swallowed him. He heard Elliot’s breathing become ragged and deep, felt Elliot dig his fingers into his hair.

“Please don’t stop,” Elliot whispered.

Ray shifted down, taking as much of the other man into his mouth as he could. He wrapped his fist around the base of Elliot’s cock and bobbed his head up and down. Ray was surprised by how clean Elliot tasted, like Irish Spring soap with hint of natural musk and salt. He bobbed his head fast, working his tongue around the tip each time, until Elliot shuddered beneath him and spurted into his mouth. Elliot relaxed his grip in Ray’s hair, massaging little circles around his head. “Fuck, you’re good at that.”

He sucked Elliot clean and looked up to see those pale green eyes fixed on him with an intensity that made him shiver. The look on Elliot’s face wasn’t quite the
fucked-to-exhaustion
look Ray was hoping for, but it was beautiful. “You’re….” Ray ran his hands up Elliot’s abs and chest. He couldn’t call another man beautiful, it felt too weird, but he wanted to.

“What?” Elliot smirked.

Ray tried to think of something else, something that would fit but wouldn’t offend Elliot.
Intoxicating
fit,
addictive
was a definite possibility, but
beautiful
was perfect. “Beautiful. I’m sorry, I know you’re a guy, but you’re gorgeous.”

“Save the bullshit.” Elliot shook his head with a smile. “Go shower, then we’ll eat.”

Ray narrowed his eyes. “It’s not bullshit. Do you have any idea how pretty your eyes are? How weird it is to see green eyes with black hair?”

“Whatever.” Elliot sat up and pulled Ray close, silencing him with a quick kiss. “Be serious, okay?”

“I’m a serious guy.”

“Hmm? Serious enough that your coworkers don’t invite you to any catered special events anymore?”

Ray tried to keep a serious expression on his face, but he couldn’t. “They told you about that?”

Elliot nodded.

“That wedding was so uptight it was more like a funeral anyway. And the only real problem was that the bride didn’t want her family to know she had any clue what a dick looked like.”

“Go shower.” Elliot laughed. “I’ll find you some clothes.”

Ray slipped off the bed and stretched as he stood up. He was stiff and a bit sore from yesterday’s sparring sessions, and a hot shower sounded like the perfect remedy. “You said it’s already six o’clock?”

“Yeah.”

“Damn. Think we could go back to the campus, help look?”

Elliot got up and began rummaging through his dresser. “Even if you skipped the shower and food, the sun would still be down before we could get there. Besides, you were the one who pointed out that Sophie Munoz probably left campus of her own free will. Clothes, toiletries, makeup bag missing—remember?”

“I didn’t forget. But new factors have come into the analysis. Someone was willing to break into my place to get Sophie’s laptop back.”

“You said yourself they don’t need an excuse to try and kill you.”

“Yeah, but if they wanted me dead, Alejandro would have killed me and what’s his name Thursday night.”

Elliot gaped at him, his eyes wide. “Your cousin used the man as a human shield, and you don’t even remember his name? I guess I should be flattered that you could still call my name to mind after eight whole months.”

“His name is Bruce Kershaw, he works at Balboa Medical Center,” said Ray. “It’s just easier to brush people off if they’re already pissed. And that’s not the point. If they can’t get the laptop itself, it’s only logical to go after her.”

“Which would explain why she packed up and disappeared,” said Elliot. “The team St. Claire has looking for her is made up of top agents, and if I can’t get in touch with Professor Holland tomorrow morning, I’ll pull his address from the DMV. We’ll find her. We’ll get her somewhere safe. We might send her to prison, but we’ll keep her safe.”

Ray sighed and nodded slowly. He knew Elliot was right.

“The best thing you can do right now is to take a shower, eat, and try and catch up on sleep so you’ll be focused tomorrow.”

Ray hesitated at the bathroom door. “Can I stay with you tonight?”

“Am I going to be another
what’s-his-name
three days from now if I say yes?”

Ray met his gaze, then looked away. “You never were.”

Ray thought Elliot’s wide-eyed expression looked panicked for a moment. Elliot tossed a pair of sweats, clean boxers, and a T-shirt at him. “Go shower.”

E
LLIOT
HAD
to admit, Ray looked better in his clothes than he did. In a borrowed polo shirt and black jeans that were snug in all the right places, he looked amazing. He looked right at home among the few young men who were willing to brave the UCSD campus Monday morning. No one, Elliot realized, could panic an entire academic
community and its surrounding neighborhoods quite like his
colleagues.

The modern, open campus that had been flooded with people Friday was now quiet and tense. Small groups of determined students huddled together as they moved from building to building. Posters of Sophie Munoz had been plastered everywhere, and right beneath most of them were fliers listing a phone number for the campus’s volunteer security escort service, a late-night program that had mobilized to offer services during the day until people calmed down. The thriving energy that always seemed to permeate universities was gone. Now it was as peaceful as the grave.

Hundreds of volunteers had searched the campus on Sunday, and now were searching the surrounding canyons where students and area residents retreated to hike and run. Elliot didn’t recall if Sophie Munoz had been a particularly active girl, but the canyons of San Diego were as much a dumping ground for impulse criminals as the Los Angeles National Forest was. The only difference was the canyons were everywhere. There were over a hundred miles of trails to search just in this part of La Jolla.

Dr. Holland’s home phone and cell were both forwarding calls to his office, but hammering on his office door at nine o’clock Monday morning hadn’t turned up the wayward professor. St. Claire had gotten Dr. Holland’s address and employment history from the university human resource office, but his home was two hours north in a little suburb called Rancho Bernardo, and tracking him down all the way up there would mean Elliot would have to waste most of his day on the road. Thirty seconds of chatting with other faculty members who shared offices in the computer science department had gotten them a rough approximation of Dr. Holland’s teaching schedule, though, and Elliot was really hopeful they would be able to catch him after his first class.

The lecture hall had two entrances, so they had taken up station in the hallway where they could keep an eye on both. They’d arrived ten minutes early, watched roughly fifty students file in, and watched all of them walk out grumbling five minutes after the class was scheduled to start. He heard a few pissed comments about filing a complaint and comments that their tuition shouldn’t go to pay the salary of a professor who can’t even bother to show up half the time.

Elliot watched Ray fidgeting nervously beside him, quietly amused by how he tapped his foot so fast it seemed to blur. He kind of liked the quiet, exhausted Ray Delgado more than the edgy, overcaffeinated man twitching beside him.

“We should just go out to his house,” Ray was even more impatient than the students leaving the auditorium.

“We will.” Elliot was having a hard time keeping his voice soothing. “Let’s give him a few more minutes.”

Ray grunted. He managed to sit still for almost ten seconds, then began to pace. A few more stragglers wandered out, giving Ray a wide berth. Elliot checked his watch. “Okay.” He gave in. “Let’s go find him.”

“Finally!”

Elliot followed Ray down two flights of stairs, then grabbed Ray’s shoulder to stop him on the third-floor landing. Trudging up the stairs below was Dr. Holland, still in blue jeans but with the ever-professional addition of a tweed jacket with leather elbow patches.

Ray met his gaze, then nodded for Elliot to follow him into the computer science faculty hall.

“He’s probably rushing to the class that just gave up on him,” said Elliot.

A few moments later, the professor proved him wrong. He turned down the hall toward them, his attention focused on digging his keys out of his pocket. Ray smirked at him.

“Dr. Holland!” Elliot moved forward and clapped his hand on the professor’s shoulder before he could retreat.