34
Trevor drowns in succulence.
Can anyone tell me how the hell I woke up this morning in a cramped spare bedroom with Elijah’s snores vibrating the walls, and twelve hours later end up here at an exotic resort sharing dinner with this gorgeous man across from me?
This gorgeous man, who’s also my boss, and maybe my lover.
Lover. I sound so ridiculous. Lover. Just thinking the word makes me giggle. I’m delirious.
“What’s got you so tickled?” asks Ben over his wine glass.
I shrug carelessly. “Oh, I don’t know. Everything. Nothing.” I giggle again. “What’s the name of this restaurant again?”
“Cocina Caribeña,” he says, the Spanish words rolling off his tongue so smoothly, it’s sexy as fuck.
Our table sits at the end of a wooden patio that overlooks a lagoon lined with white sand and beautiful trees. The sun is half-dipped in the horizon like a great glowing cookie made of molten gold, its light catching on every ripple of water.
I just finished the tastiest serving of grilled steak and cilantro-lime-marinated vegetables, and a sweet Mexican bread I’ve never heard of before. I don’t even remember the name. I don’t even remember my own name.
“You look sexy.”
I jerk my eyes back to Ben. “Thanks. I’m guessing you like my outfit. You ought to; it’s yours.”
“It’s yours,” he insists, “and you look damned sexy in it.”
The outfit he got me is sleek, yet casual, and does its job of making me feel pretty sexy. It’s a crisp white short-sleeved dress shirt with a thin grey checkered design down one half of the collar and cutting across the shirt in a thick slanted line—very art deco. With the sleeves folded up a cuff, the underside reveals a sharp black design. My slate-colored shorts, cut off above the knee, feel like they were tailored to my crotch and ass’s every contour. They look skintight, yet feel as comfortable as if I’m wearing nothing at all. I have no idea how Ben got my sizing so perfectly, as if he measured me inch-by-inch himself.
The invasiveness of that possibility has me squeezing my legs together and catching my breath a bit, imagining myself naked on a platform while Benjamin pulls out the measuring tape, strictly instructing me to stand still while he measures every single inch of my body. Blood rushes to my cheeks—and below my waist—as I feel his imaginary fingers all over me, pulling that measuring tape in my most sensitive areas. I’m suddenly twenty times more aware of how snug and perfectly the shorts fit me, as if he’s literally gripping my legs and thighs—and quickly swelling crotch—with a hundred firm, squeezing hands.
Here I am, in a foreign country, far away from home, and my only tether is my beautiful boss Ben, who sits across from me looking smoldering as ever. It’s the perfect recipe for sexiness.
“So for my birthday,” I reply, pushing away my dirty tailor fantasy, “I get a weekend in Cancún … and a new wardrobe.”
He smiles crookedly, his eyes twinkling. “I have some plans in store for tomorrow, too. Don’t think I’m just going to let you sit on your cute ass by the pool all day and bake for your birthday. I’m going to put you through the ringer, boy. I’m going to make you earn every bit of your birthday gift.”
I know he’s teasing me, but the dominant vigor in his words really turns me on. “Oh, is that so?” I challenge him, swallowing my racing heart. “All of this doesn’t come for free, huh?”
“Far from,” he teases back, a devilish quirk to his eyebrows as he goes for another sip of wine.
After dinner, we casually explore the resort with the stars above our heads and in our eyes. We stroll past kiosks of jewelry and precious stones and gold. We find boutiques selling handmade pieces of art, clothing, and household items. There’s even a tequila tasting station, which Ben insists I try, as the legal age for drinking alcohol is just 18 in Mexico. “Consider it a trial run,” he teases.
There is an unprecedented amount of sexual tension pulsing between us which is made worse every time he does the subtlest of things, like putting a hand at the small of my back (the fingers of which lightly graze my tight, material-clad ass), or leaning close to my sensitive ear to tell me something with his words shooting chills of delight down my neck and arms. He even has the nerve to full-on cup my ass with his big hand when we’re walking up a set of stairs, playing it off like he’s guiding me, but I know he’s just wanting to touch me and turn me on. He must be holding back as much as I am. Doesn’t he know that if I pop any wood in these tight shorts, there will be no way in hell to hide it?
It’s like a sexual game of chicken, seeing how long either of us can endure the tension before one of us explodes.
I’m just about at the brink of exploding point, by the way. And it’s a game at which I’m not likely to mind losing, since we both win in the end.
We pick up some churros and stroll along the wooden paths, eating them. They are notably and by far the sweetest, softest, richest churros I have ever tasted, like long fried donuts from the heavens sprinkled with cinnamon and love and Mexican magic. We end up at the end of a pier that stretches across the public beach, just barely kissed by the sea which crashes in soft, hypnotic waves below. The stars shower over the two of us from above like a dark, glittery sea all on its own.
And against all of that sweetness, Ben turns his face to mine with a look that’s up to no good. “There’s cinnamon on your lips.”
Just when I go to wipe my mouth, he catches my wrist. Then, ever so gently, he leans in and licks the corner of my lips once, pulls away, then kisses, pulls away, then goes for another—deeper and hungrier. When Ben finishes, he licks his lips as he draws back to stare into my eyes. “Tasty,” he murmurs.
I’m hard right away. If we don’t do something really soon … “You drive me crazy. You’ve been touching me all night.”
“I can’t help myself.”
“My skin is literally … like … prickling with anticipation when I’m near you. I’m … Ben, I’m crazy for you.” My heart is pounding suddenly. I have never quite voiced this before, regardless of the story my body language has clearly been telling him for weeks.
“The feelings are returned.”
I fidget with my fingers, tiny granules of cinnamon and sugar still dusting them. “Sorry for being snappy. Or jumpy. Or whatever I am. I think the mini shots of tequila are messing with my head.”
He reaches out and brushes his knuckles softly down my arm, coming to rest at my hand, which he grips tightly.
“I think you’re messing with my head,” I amend.
A twinkle of amusement enters his eyes. “Is that so?”
“That’s so,” I confirm. “That’s very so.”
“Come,” he says suddenly. “We’ve got a show to catch.”
I blink. “A show …?”
He tugs on my hand, guiding me away from the end of the pier. It isn’t until we’re halfway back to the resort that I realize he hasn’t let go.
We’re holding hands. Like boyfriends.
Don’t make a big deal out of it, Trevor. It’s only the most intimate he’s ever been with you in public, ever, and he’s not freaking out at all.
My heart warms more with every step we take. After a while, I walk even closer to him, my side pressed against his as we stroll along the water past extravagant boutiques, hot springs, and even a mariachi band, which we stop and stand among a small crowd to listen to. The crowd consists of two other couples, a family of four, and a loner teen who’s probably here with his family but “totally over it”—yet even he seems momentarily pulled out of his head, hypnotized by the rhythm of the band as they strum their guitars and toot their trumpets. There’s even a violinist among them, who takes center stage when the mariachi tune turns sweet, making us swoon with their singing in the moonlight that now bathes us.
An hour later finds us seated at a half-moon booth in front of a stage in a dim, romantic lounge. Set before us on a tiny table are two tall, blue cocktails Ben ordered for us with tiny umbrellas and pineapple chunk garnishes. A beautiful, long-limbed woman sits at a stool in a green dress, her red lips making love to a microphone as she sings. A quartet of musicians on string instruments—a cello, bass, violin, and a bearded man with a viola—provide the backdrop to her powerful voice, upon which our ears feed.
My eyes, however, are plenty fed by the man I’m cuddled up next to in this booth at the front of the lounge. He could show me twenty mariachis and a hundred beautiful singers and a thousand white-sanded beaches; all I need to fill my heart is just a single glance into his eyes.
Yep, I just said that. I’m one of those guys now.
Also, I might be a little drunk already. “Are there two singers on the stage or one?” I ask Ben quietly, feeling silly and excited for no reason at all.
He smiles at me, amused. “It doesn’t take much, does it.”
“Not at all. I don’t even know what I’m drinking. It tastes like fruit laundry detergent, except it’s … like … good?” I take another sip, just to be sure. The sip turns into a gulp. “Really, really sugary. Kinda like a blue raspberry Popsicle that’s melted.”
I get a laugh out of Ben, who shakes his head. “You need a bit of training before you can handle more than just one drink in a night. You’re acting hammered and you’ve barely—”
“Hey, now. I’m not drunk! Also, I think it’s after midnight.”
“It’s two in the morning.”
“TWO?!” I blurt, then slap a hand over my mouth. The singer onstage smiles at me while she sings, her attention drawn by my tiny outburst. I shrink into Ben’s side. “Oh, no. I am drunk. I’m one of those loud drunks I always make fun of.”
“You want to head back to the cabana? Relax and slip into the silkiest, cushiest bed sheets your skin has ever touched?”
“Yes! But after a dance.”
Ben’s face goes rigid at once. “I don’t dance.”
I leap up from my seat and excitedly grab Ben by the hand, pulling him up to his feet despite his legs turning into lead and my hip nearly knocking over my drink, if it weren’t for the sturdiness of the tiny table it sits on. I pull Ben to a small clearing, put a hand at the small of his back, and clasp his hand with my other. I take the lead in a little slow dance, swaying with the music onstage.
Ben’s face, for once, is the one blushing. “Trevor …”
“I don’t want to hear any more protests,” I demand. “This is my birthday weekend, and so we honor my wishes. And right now, all I wish is to dance with my boyfriend and enjoy the music.”
His eyes flash. “Boyfriend …?”
I freeze in his arms. My feet stop moving. I didn’t even realize I’d said it. Can I blame the alcohol and call it a slip of the loosened tongue, playing it off?
I look up into his eyes. “Shut up. I’m drunk.”
“Are we boyfriends now?”
He won’t let it go. “It just slipped.” I bury my face in his chest, then distractingly remind myself how firm and shapely his pecs are. “Your chest is making me horny,” I whisper to him, though with my swimming state of mind considered, it probably came out in a hollering moan.
“You smell great,” he murmurs into my hair.
I crumble under him, clinging tighter as we dance in slow circles to the sound of singing strings and a woman’s soft vibrato. “You smell like sexy,” I moan back.
He chuckles. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“It does to me,” I retort smugly.
“Are you sure I don’t smell like boyfriend?”
I reach down and grip his ass tightly, squeezing it, but I meant to smack it for that jape of his. Ben draws his head back to look at me, smirking as he figures out what I’m trying to do.
“We should probably get back to the room,” I decide in a tiny voice, “before I try to form a comeback and accidentally take off my pants on this dance floor instead.”
He pulls me against his body tighter—so tightly our crotches grind against one another. That doesn’t help my giddiness at all, pulling every ounce of my mind straight to our swelling cocks, the heat coming off my face from the alcohol—and my sudden and unexplained desire to take off all our clothes.
If we didn’t have the attention of the whole place already, we certainly do now.
Ben puts a finger under my chin to lift it to his lips, which come down from the muscular mountain of him for a kiss. “Good idea,” Ben finally agrees when he pulls away.
We leave the lounge at once and take a long winding path around the resort back to all of the cabanas that line the private beaches. I don’t even remember the walk; the first thing I’m aware of is being back in the cabana with the pretty lamps and the lush furniture and the salty air. I get my clothes off in a fit of giggles, dizzy, then drop onto the bed completely naked. The feel of the soft sheets on my skin is like swimming in whipped cream and ocean breeze. I don’t even know how I’m angled on the bed, spread out akimbo with a drunken smile stretched from one ear to the other.
Ben nestles against my body and pulls me into his arms. He’s naked, too, I realize. I grunt and explore his body with my sleepy, clumsy fingers. Somewhere between a lazy kiss and the grazing of his hand along my bare ass, I drift away.