Chris stumbled into his room, locked in a kiss with Ant. They crashed together much as they had before, but without the hesitancy now that they were on the same page.

Ant’s large hands cupped Chris’s ass, lifting him off the floor, and Chris gasped a laugh against his mouth. “You’re strong.”

“Better believe it,” Ant rumbled, holding Chris so tight to his body Chris could feel the hard bar of Ant’s cock prodding into him. It felt deliciously thick, and Chris rocked against it as Ant stumbled to the bed.

Chris was lowered gently to the mattress, Ant’s body coming down over his. Ant felt so big, so hard, as he pressed into Chris everywhere. His bulk was reassuring even as it pinned Chris like a butterfly. He struggled to lift his hips, seeking friction for his aching cock, and devoured Ant’s mouth as if it was his last meal.

Ant pushed himself up on his arms, his muscles popping as they took his weight. It gave Chris his first easy breath of air since they’d dropped onto the bed, but it also took Ant’s lips and body away. Chris made a sound of complaint, lifting his head to chase the kiss.

Ant chuckled. “Easy, sweetness. I’ll take care of you.”

Chris settled for kissing Ant’s chin and throat, unable to reach his mouth. His hands found their way under Ant’s shirt and pushed it up. He needed Ant’s skin against his, his muscle pressing into him.

“Then get on with it,” he murmured, catching Ant’s nipple between his teeth as Ant tugged off his shirt. Ant arched with a groan, shirt tangled around his arms. Chris took full advantage of his momentary entrapment to work over both his nipples, biting one while he rolled the other in his fingers.

Ant got his shirt off with a growl and pushed Chris down on the bed. “You’re trouble.”

Chris grinned up at him. “Better punish me.”

Ant lifted Chris’s leg and slapped his ass before popping the button on his jeans and peeling them from his body.

“Jesus Christ,” Ant panted as he fought fabric clinging to Chris’s sweaty limbs, “how did you breathe in these fucking things?”

“Carefully,” Chris said with a laugh. “They worked, though, didn’t they?”

“How?” Ant asked distractedly as he finally got them down Chris’s legs and yanked off his shoes to pull them free.

“Got you back in my bed. Right where I wanted you.”

Ant slapped Chris’s ass, making him jump at the sudden searing pain. The crack of Ant’s palm against now bared flesh was loud in the room.

“Oh, shit,” Ant said, smoothing his palm over Chris’s stinging skin. “I thought you’d have underwear, sorry.” He traced the waistband of the jockstrap Chris wore. “This is sexy as fuck.”

Chris felt a flush working its way through his body as Ant leaned down to kiss his inner thigh, then nuzzle his balls.

“Kinda necessary with jeans that tight.”

Ant huffed a laugh onto Chris’s cock, his breath warming it through the fabric.

Chris moaned, pushing his hips up. “Take the damn thing off.”

Ant grinned at him mischievously, but he followed orders, hooking his fingers in the waistband and dragging off the jockstrap. Chris’s cock sprang up, slapping his belly. It was flushed dark red and aching for Ant’s mouth.

Seeing the way Ant looked at him, at his hard cock, gave Chris a renewed sense of power. He gripped the base of his cock and tilted it toward Ant’s mouth. “Want a taste?”

“You know I do.”

Ant’s large hands gripped Chris’s hips, immobilizing him, and hot, wet heat enveloped Chris’s length as Ant swallowed him down.

Chris groaned, the sound dragged from somewhere deep in his chest. “Fuck, Ant.”

Ant moaned around his cock in reply, the vibration of his voice sending another shudder of pleasure through Chris.

He tried to move, to thrust, but Ant’s grip was like iron. He had no choice but to lie there and take whatever Ant chose to give him. Granted, what Ant gave him was pretty fantastic. But Chris wanted more than to lie passive and let Ant suck out his cum.

He slipped a hand into Ant’s hair, dragging his head up. Ant resisted at first, as if he couldn’t bear to give up his treat, and wasn’t that an ego stroke?

Chris tugged again. “Ant, wait.”

Ant slurped up to the head of Chris’s cock, swirling his tongue around it while staring at Chris with defiant eyes before finally pulling off. “Am I not up to your standards?”

“Don’t be crazy,” Chris said. “You’re amazing. But this is going to be over fast if you keep going, and I want to touch you too.”

Ant backed off the bed to strip the rest of his clothes, while Chris whipped off his shirt so they could be naked together. Chris’s eyes dropped to Ant’s cock, thick and meaty between his thighs. He’d seen it before, when Ant traipsed around naked that morning, but he was too hungover to really appreciate it. Besides, he hadn’t had the right to touch and taste then. Now that dick belonged to him.

Ant knelt on the bed beside him, and Chris wrapped his fingers around Ant’s cock, fingertips just meeting on either side. “This is the perfect size. Not too small, not too—”

“You better not say not too big,” Ant said. “You’ll give me a complex.”

Chris laughed. “You don’t want to be too big. How will you get in my ass?”

Ant sucked in a breath, fucking into Chris’s fist. “That’s what you want?”

Chris used his free hand to grab the back of Ant’s neck and tug him down for a sloppy kiss. “Yeah, Ant. It’s what I want. So, fucking give it to me.”

Ant flipped Chris onto his stomach, then grabbed his hips to tug him onto hands and knees. Before him, the line of Chris’s back was a smooth canvas of skin and muscle. His slender frame often gave Chris an air of delicacy. But now, Ant could see the strength in his body. Chris’s muscles flexed beautifully as he pushed himself into the shape best suited to taking Ant’s cock. He arched slightly, pushing his ass up and out, and Ant cupped it in his hands, squeezing the firm flesh.

“So gorgeous,” he muttered.

Chris trembled beneath him, and Ant didn’t take this moment for granted. He’d been stupid to ever think Chris wanted a meaningless fuck. That wasn’t who Chris was, not with Ant anyway. He’d had his share of hookups, but Chris had told him from the beginning that he found those to be empty and unsatisfying. He wanted something real, which is why Ant had originally suggested they could wait until they knew each other better.

He’d never imagined he’d run out of time so soon. He’d only known that Chris was a guy worth the wait. Because he hadn’t wanted a quick fuck either. He wanted a partner, someone smart and down to earth. He’d thought he had that with Raul, but his ex-boyfriend had been too flighty. He lived for drama, cutting down other men with his friends in the clubs and trotting Ant out like arm candy. Raul had never really been interested in what Ant wanted outside the bedroom.

He and Chris had connected more on their first date than Ant had in the five months he’d spent with Raul. If it took a drunken marriage to get Chris to give him a chance, then he was fucking grateful as hell to Jack Daniels.

“Ant, come on,” Chris said, pushing harder into his hands. “You gonna fuck me or stare at my ass all night?”

“Can’t I do both?” Ant asked, but he left the bed to find his wallet and retrieve his condom and packet of lube. When he returned, tearing open the condom packet with his teeth, Chris glanced back at him nervously.

“It’s been a while.”

“How long?” Ant asked, not because he needed to know but because the caveman in him wanted to hear Chris say he hadn’t been fucked in a while.

“Two years.”

Ant nearly dropped the packet of lube. “Years?”

“Since I’ve bottomed,” Chris clarified.

Ant paused in the act of rolling on the condom. “Do you usually top?”

That would put an interesting spin on things. Ant had bottomed, but it wasn’t his preference. There was something about rutting like a wild beast that he needed to really enjoy sex. Maybe he was just a testosterone-driven, unenlightened Neanderthal, but he liked taking his man. But he wanted Chris enough that he’d give him anything he wanted.

“No,” Chris said with a breathless laugh, and Ant breathed out a sigh of relief. “It’s been two years since I’ve fucked, but I’m not celibate.”

Ah, he got it now. Ant opened the lube packet and slathered his cock, then got his fingers slippery and pushed a fingertip up against Chris’s hole.

Chris sucked in a breath, tensing as Ant prodded him.

“Try to relax for me,” Ant said.

Chris huffed another laugh. “You don’t know me very well, do you? I think you called it this morning when you said I’d never unclench enough for you to fuck me.”

Ant felt a stab of regret over that comment. He leaned forward, kissing the back of Chris’s neck. “Hey, you know I wasn’t serious.”

“You’re not wrong about me being uptight.”

Ant dropped more kisses, dragging his lips from one shoulder to the other. Bit by bit, Chris relaxed under him. Ant circled a wet fingertip, rubbing but not pushing, until he felt Chris rock back toward the pressure. He pushed in slow and steady, and Chris’s body took one finger in a hot, tight grasp.

Ant worked Chris open, hoping he didn’t run out of lube before he had him ready, but Chris began to soften and spread for him now that he was stroking his insides. “So good, sweetness.”

“You’re not even fucking me yet,” Chris protested, grunting as he impaled himself now on two of Ant’s thick fingers.

“I’m not?” Ant said, aiming his fingers for Chris’s prostate. Chris jumped under him, crying out.

“Fuck!”

“I think you’re ready for me.”

“Yeah,” Chris said, voice hoarse. “Please.”

Oh yeah, nothing was better than hearing that little, pleading word. Chris wanted him bad, and Ant was going to give him a fucking he’d never forget. If he had his way, he’d ensure Chris never wanted to be anywhere else.

He withdrew his fingers and pressed the broad tip of his cock against Chris. Then he pushed.

Ant’s cock stretched him wide, and it was so much. His rim ached, then burned as Ant filled him. Ant slowly worked his cock inside inch by inch, and by the time he was fully inside, Chris was shaking so hard his arms could barely support him.

Ant stroked a soothing hand down his spine, then encouraged him to lower his chest to the bed. The angle put more pressure on his insides, but in a good way, and he made a sound of approval.

“There you go,” Ant said. “You ready for me now?”

Chris, heart still hammering from the strain, nodded. Stretched and filled as he was, his body craved more. He pushed his hips back tentatively, and pleasure rippled through him. “Yes,” he gasped. “Move, please.”

Ant lost no time in giving him what he wanted. He gripped Chris’s hips, keeping his touch firm but gentle, and drew his cock out until just the tip was inside Chris, the ridged head of his cock catching at the edges of Chris’s rim. Then he slammed in, the force pushing Chris’s breath from his body. He rocked forward under the force of Ant’s thrusts, shoving a hand forward to brace himself against the headboard so he didn’t get a concussion. Ant fucked like a wild man, but Chris was right there with him, crying out and pushing back into the punishing thrusts eagerly.

Their patience had paid off, as Chris’s body took everything Ant gave him and begged for more.

“Harder,” Chris panted, unable to believe the words that came out of his mouth. As it was, Ant was about to break him in half.

Ant chuckled. “I’ve created a monster.”

But he slid a hand under Chris’s torso, lifting him up and back so they were plastered together, Chris’s sweaty back to Ant’s slick chest. Chris turned his head, catching Ant’s mouth in a desperate kiss as Ant’s cock went in deeper, at a new angle that made Chris groan with delight.

Ant grabbed Chris’s right hand and guided it to his hard cock bobbing in front of them.

“Touch yourself,” Ant murmured. “Wanna feel you come while you’re riding my dick.”

His filthy words sent waves of lust breaking over Chris’s head, and he stroked his cock feverishly. Pressure and pleasure mounted together as the thick cock rammed him again and again while Chris jerked his cock as if his life depended on it.

“Coming,” he gasped, feeling the telltale tingle in his balls a split-second before it shot up his spine and sprayed from his dick in a fountain of cum. White streaks splattered the headboard and the pillow below them as Chris’s ass tightened around Ant’s cock, echoes of his orgasm strumming through his ass.

Ant made a garbled sound, jerking as he shot his release. His arm was still wrapped around Chris like an iron bar to ensure he stayed where Ant wanted him. Joined like that, aftershocks still sparking through him, Chris felt his chest tighten as if his heart was too large to be contained by bone and tissue.

This was right. Chris and Ant, together this way. It was so right he mourned for all the time he’d cost them. He’d been afraid — of what he would or wouldn’t hear. He wasn’t sure which. He only knew that fear had kept him from a man he could have loved. Maybe already did a little. As much as you could love someone you were still getting to know.

The potential had been there, and in this moment, it felt fully realized.

“Chris,” Ant murmured in his ear. “What is it? You’ve gone all tense in my arms.”

Chris nodded, blinking hard against the emotion. He was not one of those assholes who got all teary over sex. But damn, sex with Ant hadn’t just been on another level, it’d been on another plane of existence.

“M’okay,” he mumbled, extracting himself from Ant’s arms and dropping onto the bed.

Ant looked down at him, concern wrinkling his brow. “You don’t regret it, do you?”

Chris sat up, raising a hand to Ant’s face. “No! No, of course not,” he said. “I was just … overwhelmed for a minute. Give me a break, okay? Sex with you isn’t for mere mortal men.”

The corners of Ant’s lips twitched. “Told you I’d be legendary in bed.”

Chris flopped back onto the pillow, right into his own wet spot, but he didn’t care. He sighed, his entire body relaxed as it hadn’t been in far too long. “Got that right. Looks like I married well, huh?”

Ant dropped down next to him, propping himself on an elbow to look down at Chris. “I like this new, kinder Chris Everett.”

Chris winced. “I’m sorry if I’ve been a jackass.”

“You haven’t, not really.”

“I’ll listen to you now,” Chris said. “I wasn’t ready before, but I am now.”

Ant kissed his cheek. “Thank you. Let’s shower and get comfortable. Then I’ll tell you a bedtime story.”

“Does it have a happy ending?”

“That remains to be seen.”

They showered and returned to bed, where Ant tugged Chris into his arms and guided his head onto his chest. Then he sighed, feeling a sort of contentment that had been missing from his life.

“Okay, let’s hear it,” Chris said.

Ant chuckled, feeling Chris’s tension where their bodies touched. “It won’t be that painful. Relax, okay?”

Chris blew out a long breath and nodded. “Okay, I’m ready.”

Ant began with how he met Raul. He’d taken his second-grade class on a field trip to the local art museum. Raul was a curator there, and he led the students on a tour, talking about the different art styles on display.

“He was sophisticated and polished,” Ant said.

“And not hard on the eyes either,” Chris put in. The Latino man had been exquisite, with perfectly symmetrical features and thick, lustrous hair. He was petite, almost delicate, but there was a sort of fragile beauty to him.

Chris didn’t see how he could possibly stack up to that.

“I like classy men,” Ant said, smiling wryly. “I couldn’t be less interested in guys like me, all muscle, no substance.”

“You’ve got substance,” Chris objected. “I knew that from our very first date. I struggled a little to reconcile my assumptions about a weight trainer with your intelligence. It makes a lot of sense to know you’re a teacher. Not that weight trainers are dumb…”

Ant chuckled. “Just keep digging that hole.”

“Sorry.”

Ant tightened his arms around Chris, holding him just that bit closer. “I know what you mean,” he said. “Teaching second grade isn’t rocket science, but I’m proud of it.”

In his family, becoming a teacher was a high achievement. His younger brother was steadily applying himself to failing out of his senior year of high school. His father spent his life working jobs that clocked in only slightly above minimum wage, while his mother waitressed, flirting for tips to get them by. It wasn’t surprising, he supposed, that their marriage fell apart. They’d fought about bills and money nonstop.

“You should be proud,” Chris said. “Better than retail.”

“You love clothes and fashion. You’re always so put together and perfect—”

“Hardly!” Chris shifted to rest his chin on Ant’s chest and look up at him. “I just use clothes like a shield. If I can project the image I want people to have of me, maybe they won’t notice all the flaws beneath.”

Ant traced his lips with a finger. “You seem pretty perfect to me.”

Chris slipped out his pink tongue to circle Ant’s finger before sucking it in. He hollowed his cheeks, sucking Ant’s index finger, and stared into his eyes.

Ant remembered vividly the moment that morning when Chris had sucked his finger in a panic to get his ring off. He hadn’t done it nearly as seductively, but Ant’s cock had gotten hard then. He had no hope now, groaning as he hardened beneath Chris.

“Are you trying to sidetrack me?”

Chris released his finger with a pop. “No. Continue.”

He smiled mischievously, bumping his knee against Ant’s hard cock. “When you’re done, we’ll do something about this guy. Something that doesn’t involve my sore ass.”

Ant smirked. “Poor baby,” he said, lowering a hand to massage Chris’s butt cheek.

Trying to clear his head, Ant focused on what he needed to say. He wanted to get this over with and get back to enjoying Chris’s beautiful body.

“Anyway, while I was on that field trip, Raul flirted subtly. He slipped me his number before we left.”

“Classy,” Chris murmured.

“He wasn’t obvious about it,” Ant said. “But yeah, I found out soon enough, he wasn’t so classy. Raul was kind of a party animal. He loved to hit the clubs and dance, and at first that was fine by me. He was sexy, and the dancing was fun. The sex afterward was hot.”

“TMI.”

Ant chuckled. “Sorry. I’m just saying, things seemed good, but I started noticing things. He flirted with every man who crossed his path. He was moody. He went from these elated highs to these dark, dark lows, and in the middle, look out. The man was crazy. I don’t mean that literally. I don’t think he had a condition, but everything was a crisis. Like if his car didn’t start, it was the end of the world. But if his jeans made his ass look fat, same reaction.”

Chris snorted. “That man couldn’t possibly look fat in anything.”

“Very true,” Ant said, musing. “He was slim and graceful. Part of me was afraid of breaking him.”

Chris cleared his throat. “Moving on.”

He sounded testy, but fair enough. No one wanted to hear the guy they just fucked waxing poetic about an ex.

“Sorry,” Ant murmured. “We broke up for a lot of reasons. I really wanted to settle in and build a life with someone, and I was starting to outgrow the clubbing phase. I mean, weekends are fine, but every night? I didn’t want that. I had lessons to plan, and I didn’t enjoy the cattiness of Raul and his friends. They weren’t like you guys. You guys are real friends who look out for one another. Raul and his clique were like the mean girls in high school.”

“Yeah, I’ve come across guys like that,” Chris murmured.

“I realized we wanted different things out of life,” Ant said. “Ultimately, I’m kind of a cliché. I want a house and a dog and a partner. Maybe even a kid one day.”

He checked Chris’s expression to see if he’d see horror there, but Chris didn’t look too upset by the notion.

“Raul laughed at me, said I was just buying into what straight people brainwash us to want.”

“That’s an extreme way of looking at it,” Chris said. “He’s not entirely wrong, though.”

Ant tensed. “No?”

Chris blinked up at him. “Society influences our world view. Families are all around us, with their house, and their dog, and their children. Of course that colors our expectations. Being raised by heterosexuals makes coming to terms with a different sexuality a challenge. We’re now different from our family, set apart in a way that maybe we don’t want to be. We look around and realize we don’t fit the picture all around us, but we keep trying to fit because we’re a product of that society.”

“So, you agree with him?” Ant asked. “Does that mean you don’t want those things?”

“No,” Chris said, making Ant’s heart falter before he continued. “Of course I do. That’s kind of the point. I grew up with that picture of love and family and success, and I want it.”

“Oh, so you agree we’re brainwashed.”

“I probably wouldn’t use that term, but yeah. We are. But so are heterosexuals, right? We all grow up in a society with certain norms. We’re all programmed to want those things. It’s part of life, I guess. If we grew up in a different culture with different norms, we’d want different things.”

“You sure you work in detail? You’re not hiding a doctorate, are you?”

Chris smirked. “No, just a business degree, but maybe I took a few liberal arts courses.”

“Aha, that explains it,” Ant teased. “So, anyway, that’s my story. I broke up with Raul, and he didn’t take it well. He was the sort of guy who got pissed off if he lost a board game, so losing a relationship? It wasn’t pretty.”

“Was he unstable?”

“Not in any definable way, but it couldn’t be healthy, having that kind of temper,” Ant said. “He refused to acknowledge the breakup. He called and texted, and showed up at my apartment a few times. By the time you and I were on that date, I hadn’t seen him in a while. I thought he’d finally moved on. Turns out, not so much.”

“Was he stalking you?”

“Nothing that extreme. I mean, I guess at first, he sort of was. It was more like he was hoping I’d forget about the breakup and go back to the way things were. I set him straight on that, and he left me alone. I should have asked you to go somewhere else. When you mentioned that restaurant, I knew it was one of his favorites, but I didn’t want to explain my ex.”

“You should have,” Chris said. “I told you about my dating nightmares. Some of them.”

“I wish I had,” Ant murmured. “You would have known Raul wasn’t what he seemed when he showed up at that night. Everything might have been different.”

“I’m sorry I wouldn’t hear you out,” Chris said. “I was so sure I knew what I’d seen, and I didn’t want to hear excuses.”

“And anything I said would have sounded like an excuse,” Ant added.

“Maybe,” Chris said. “But I was already feeling like you were too good to be true. Then Raul came along, and he seemed to validate my feelings. I didn’t deserve you. Once again, my love life was a disaster, and I should stop trying.”

“Chris,” Ant said tentatively, lifting his chin with a finger. “You need to stop thinking like that.”

“I’m trying.”

Ant kissed his lips softly. “You deserve everything you want.”