Zach was thrilled. Hard as the day had been, it might end up being good for both of them. Beth and Chris had met them both at the jetty. Beth had been to the doctor’s and had been given the okay health wise for both her and the baby. She had refused to get a copy of the scan or to know what the sex was because she had shrugged and asked what the point was really. Zach had thought that was a little sad, but he admired the fact that not once had she mentioned the possibility of an abortion. While he was a big believer in any woman making her own decision, he thought it was kind of cool giving another family the chance of having a child.

Ben seemed happy to let Beth tell them about her and Chris’s day as they headed to the hotel and much to Zach’s surprise didn’t seem to need to go around to the back entrance. Beth said the hotel had been much quieter without the daughter-in-law from hell, and she had gotten a chance to see Noah and even talk about college. She wasn’t convinced though.

They had a new guest in room fifteen who seemed a bit cranky and had said no one was allowed to clean his room except between the hours of two and three fifteen in the afternoon. That had produced much eye rolling.

“You’ll have to ask Josh about the worst guests we’ve had because I can’t remember much, but there was this one woman who insisted on walking around naked,” Ben suddenly said as they walked up the path.

“You’re joking?” Zach couldn’t see Josh allowing nudity if he wouldn’t have bachelor parties.

“No, get this. She wasn’t gay and was convinced there was no such thing. She was researching this paper for some university on the whole argument about being born gay or it being a choice, and she made a pass at Matt.”

“She didn’t,” Beth said in awe.

“Yep, walked right up the jetty shedding her clothes like some sort of striptease.”

Zach grinned. He could just imagine. He wasn’t even sure Matt was gay anyway.

“But the best thing was, she was so busy looking at Matt, she didn’t look where she was going and fell in.”

Zach burst out laughing, thrilled when he heard a similar happy noise from Chris.

“Anyway, of course, Matt had to jump in and pull her out, but by that time, she was panicking because the stupid woman couldn’t swim. She was fighting Matt, and he ended up struggling to get her on the jetty because she was screaming and thrashing. All the other guests came rushing down to see what was going on.”

“What happened?” Beth asked.

“May-belle punched her in the face.”

“No,” both Zach and Beth said in disbelief at the same time.

“Yep, actually a full-on punch, not a slap, and called her an ‘imbecilic moron’ and said if Josh didn’t throw her off the island, she would push her back in.”

“I love that lady,” Zach said with feeling.

Beth marched them through reception and stopped at Zach’s door. She laughed nervously and pressed a key to one of the carts into his palm. “It’s just past the kitchen door, but please feel free to ask me if you would like a taxi driver later.”

Before she let go, he bent and pressed a fleeting kiss on her cheek then had a second of panic wondering if he’d overstepped, but he just heard a happy sigh and a cheeky laugh. “It’s so true what they say. All the good ones are gay.”

Ben pulled him in the door and closed it behind them. “Hey, what are doing going around kissing the staff?” he murmured and stepped into Zach’s arms.

‘I’ve found it gets better service,” Zach teased. “Softer pillows, those little chocolates, towels—”

“Wow,” Ben interrupted then started laughing. He collapsed onto Zach, heaving for breaths. “You’ve been kissing Susie as well?” he gasped, dissolving into another peal of laughter.

“What the hell?” Zach said in amusement, wondering what on earth Ben was talking about.

“Oh, look, can you see above the bed?”

Zach squinted and saw movement. “What is it?”

“It’s a balloon—a pink one, and there’s little heart-shaped chocolates on the pillow and—”

Zach spun him back around to face him. He loved hearing the laughter in Ben’s voice and hearing him happy, but if he didn’t get his lips on his right this fucking second, he would explode.

“Oh,” Ben made a small surprised sound, and they were finally pressed together. Lips collided, hands stroked and possessed, and hips ground into each other.

“I need you so much,” Zach moaned at the same time as he was pulling at Ben’s clothes.

“And I don’t care if Josh gets mad,” Ben agreed.

“What?” That made him pause.

Ben laughed again. “If the food gets spoiled.”

“I’ll eat it cold,” Zach mumbled as Ben pulled the shirt over his head.

“He’s not an idiot.” Ben bent his head just a little and licked the edge of Zach’s nipple. “I don’t think he’d expect to serve our dinner right away.”

“I don’t care,” Zach said fervently, shedding the rest of his clothing as he strained to get his hands on Ben’s cock. In a quick move, he pulled Ben around and pinned him to the door. “Don’t move.” It was an order, but Zach was ready to beg, and he heard a pleading whine from Ben’s throat. The same noise he had always made when he was so turned on he would burst. He knew Ben craved the dominance Zach exerted when he was with him. Zach lifted both Ben’s arms above his head and held them with one hand. He clasped Ben’s now free and thickening cock in his other hand.

“You love this,” he said, his voice carrying confidently. Ben gave an answering moan. “You love it when I make you take me anyway I want.” The gasp was audible as Ben tried to buck into Zach’s hand, whimpering in acknowledgment.

Zach reached over and got the lube from the first drawer without letting go of Ben’s hands. He quickly squirted some on the end of his cock and threw the bottle on the floor. He groaned as he fondled his own cock, getting his hand slippery and wet before using the same hand to stroke Ben.

“Zach,” Ben cried out as he felt Zach’s fingers stroking and pulling him to hardness. Zach dropped his left arm to circle Ben’s waist and hold him up because he knew his knees were giving way. He kissed and licked and gently bit all the way down his spine and, with his other hand, slipped his fingers under Ben and cupped his balls.

“Fuck,” Ben whispered, his head falling back onto Zach’s shoulder as if it was too heavy for his neck to hold it up. Zach was hard. Hard and leaking and Ben was shaking. The sounds from his mouth were dirty, begging, and desperate.

“Now,” Ben begged. “Need you now.”

Zach didn’t answer because he wasn’t sure he could, but the keening noise from Ben snapped his last thread of control, and he angled himself, nearly lifting Ben up and onto his cock. How he didn’t come right that fucking second was beyond him because the silky slide and the glorious wet heat mixed with the cries and moans coming from Ben’s throat combined to create the most erotic experience he’d ever had in his entire damn life. Ben arched and, setting his hands against the door, pushed back onto Zach, and Zach held them both. He rammed back, forcing Ben to give then lifted him slightly and dropped him down. Ben’s cry was pure lust and sex and every wicked thing Zach had ever done. Planting his feet, he reached around with his other hand and wrapped his fingers around Ben. “Come. Come now,” he ordered because he couldn’t wait one more second, and he screwed his eyes shut tight as Ben yelled and spurted hot and heavy over his hand.

Finally, Zach’s vision whitened as pure pleasure tightened his body and, for a second, seemed to stop his heart until wave after wave of a mind-numbing orgasm wracked his body. How he managed to still hold Ben up, he never knew.

“Baby,” Zach gasped when he could make his brain form words. His softening cock slipped from Ben’s body after what seemed like an age, but he stayed curled over him for another few seconds, a secure arm around his waist. In fact, he never wanted to move. Zach didn’t need to see Ben to know what he would look like because Ben had only ever let Zach see him like this. Semen running down his legs, sweat-slicked hair, flushed skin, and closed eyes. “This was always my favorite look on you,” Zach whispered.

“What?” Ben whispered.

“This,” Zach’s voice cracked, “is when you are truly beautiful.” He gently turned Ben around and folded him into his arms, pressing Ben’s head under his chin. He hesitated because this was important. He needed to say exactly what was in his heart. “You only ever let go with me. You never went anywhere unless all your clothes were planned out, coordinated. Makeup done and hair just so.” Zach brought his hands up and gently but deliberately cupped both sides of his face and brought Ben’s lips to his for a kiss. “I was the only one you trusted to see you like this, and you have no idea how much that meant to me.” Zach traced the swallow down Ben’s delicate throat with his thumb. “I loved all my pictures of you, but I would have adored these shots. This is when you are truly beautiful.”

Ben lowered his head. “Not anymore,” he mumbled.

“Uh-huh,” Zach shook his head. “I have taken stunning pictures all over the world, but this one of you would be completely breathtaking.” He smiled. “It would win me any award I wanted, but it never will because this picture is of my heart and could never be shared with anyone else.”

Ben made a noise in the back of his throat and buried his head against Zach’s chest.

Zach enjoyed a leisurely bath with Ben. This time he sat a seemingly boneless Ben in front of him and washed him thoroughly. When he fondled his cock and very gently washed around his hole, Ben groaned. Zach chuckled. It wouldn’t take much to make them both hard again, but he had already called Josh and apologized and asked pretty please could they have their dinner?

Ben then returned the favor and dried him when they got out, but Zach had to stop him from being quite so thorough. “If you want to eat, you have to stop.”

He couldn’t see the arch of Ben’s eyebrow, but he knew it was there. Ben finished quickly and passed him a T-shirt and shorts then led him outside via the patio door he never even knew his room had. He could smell the ocean instantly and knew it was dark but could make out a dim glow in the direction of where he was being led by Ben. “Aww,” Ben murmured. “Josh has made us a beautiful table with candles and little tea lights everywhere.”

Zach took a deep, happy breath and pushed the nerves away. Then they disappeared completely because Ben simply led him to his chair and sat in his lap, exactly the same way they had on the plane. Stephanie served them shrimp cocktail, and Ben fed Zach every morsel. Sharing bites and sharing kisses, Zach ate the melt-in-your-mouth steak and crunchy green beans in complete contentment, and they both relaxed, blissfully happy in each other’s company. “I’ve thought some more about the speech therapy.”

“Yes?” Ben said, the lilt in his voice showing he was interested.

“The University of South Florida has a speech and language clinic. There are a lot of things I can do from the Tampa center as well as online, and Robert has some contacts that could help me. He mentioned it yesterday, and I forgot to tell you.”

Ben seemed to be holding his breath.

“And—I haven’t talked about it with Josh or Daniel yet—but you told me Charlie is studying art therapy because, long-term, Daniel wants to be able—I’m assuming—to offer other things here?” he paused. “I wouldn’t need to see to be able to do that.”

“But is it something you would love, or something you would be forced into?”

Zach angled his gaze at Ben even though he couldn’t focus, rewarding him with a light kiss on his cheek. “I thought about that,” he admitted, “but it’s something that’s fascinated me since I started working with the children’s charities. And, to be honest, meeting Chris here has made me want to help more.”

“Did Josh tell you about the other brother and sister we are getting?”

“No?”

“I don’t know a lot about them, but the sister has Down’s Syndrome. Daniel is very determined to have them here. They got held up because of a legal issue, I don’t really know what kind. But I remember a boy at school who had Down’s, and his speech was affected somehow—”

“I think there is some correlation between Downs and cleft palates,” Zach said, his interest sparking. “But, funnily enough, I read that one therapist thinks a lot of the speech issues are just mimicry, meaning if you speak very slowly and clearly to children because you think they won’t understand, they will grow up with those speech patterns and only using simple words because no one has tried to expand their vocabulary. A lot of children grow up with hang-ups their parents might even have innocently given them.”

Ben was quiet. Zach didn’t have to see to know what he was thinking about. He wanted to ask, to know everything, but he wasn’t sure they were quite there yet. “I once stayed at a mission run by nuns in Addis Ababa. The oldest nun there—she looked ninety at least—was the one that all the children adored the most. She was funny and fierce and had all these ridiculous sayings and firm opinions on how children should be brought up. Her favorite was ‘Your greatest contribution may not be something you do in the world, but someone you raise.’”

“It was my birthday,” Ben whispered suddenly. “I only knew because somehow Maggie had found out and mentioned it the day before. I must have been—what? Seven, eight maybe and still at the stage where I was convinced that, somehow, I was gonna get the things all the other kids at school did.”

Zach dropped a kiss on his head and steeled himself.

“I didn’t disturb mom that morning as usual. She would either be in bed or sometimes on the floor, and I knew better than to make a noise. School seemed to go on forever that day, and I ran all the way home, not caring it was raining hard and I was getting wet.” He swallowed. “I was convinced that something—a cake, a hug, a kiss—would be waiting for me, even though I really should have known better. The door was locked. Which was really odd because she never did that, even when there were men there. So, I banged on the door, and she told me to get lost. I must have sat on that step for ages until Maggie found me and took me to her place to dry off. I went home later when she turned the light on, and she never mentioned my birthday and neither did I.”

Zach pressed his lips into Ben’s hair and just breathed. He wouldn’t wish harm on anyone, but a small part of him was glad the woman was dead. Did that make him a monster? Or was it just human? He didn’t know. “I’m so sorry, baby.”

Ben shrugged. “It was a long time ago. It’s nice to hear you want to alter someone else’s life though. To make it better.”

“And it’s not that I have this desperate desire to be a parent,” Zach continued, sensing Ben wanted the focus off him. “But I think it would be great to be able to make a difference in someone’s life.” He smiled. ‘Sister Catherine would approve, certainly.”

“So, you are thinking everything might tie in?”

“For me, yes.” And he was. He wanted to make his home with Ben, and the thought he could help people like he had seen on his trips gave him purpose. Purpose he’d been lacking for months.

Ben relaxed back on Zach, and Stephanie appeared to offer them coffee and to clear away. “Josh said to say he has crème brulee or chocolate cake or ice cream or—”

Zach held his hand up laughing. “We’ll have the ice cream, just one dish please.” He waited until Stephanie had left and leaned over to whisper in Ben’s ear. “Do you remember the way we ate ice cream?”

Ben’s answering whine came immediately. “You, of course, never ate much.” Zach loved ice cream and Ben would never eat anything like that, so Zach had told Ben he would just have to lie there and be Zach’s dish. He had licked the strawberry ice cream that he pooled on Ben’s belly until Ben had squirmed and giggled then he started licking in other places and very soon Ben was making different noises.

“Is vanilla okay?” Stephanie said brightly, arriving back and putting down a dish.

“Excellent,” Zach said and stood up carefully, making sure Ben had his balance and picking up the dish. “I’m getting a little cold,” he said brightly. “I think we’ll take it inside.”

Ben waited until Stephanie had gone before bursting into laughter. Zach smiled, not blaming him one bit. It still had to be at least eighty degrees.