Page 21 of Ring My Bell

“I don’t think I’m making any sense,” I muttered, and he drew back, frowning. “Sorry, sorry. I just… my internal monologue was getting confusing.”

He stared. Then a slow smile curled across his lips, and his hands landed on my hips. “Sometimes, I wish I could hear your internal monologue, but other times, I think you’re about fifty steps ahead of where I am, and I’d just be lost.”

“What does that mean?” I asked, barely a breath to the words.

“It means,” he said, leaning a tiny bit closer, so our bare chests were touching, so the faint thump of his heart beat against my own skin. I couldn’t stop the shiver racing through me, the telltale flush spreading up my throat to my cheeks. “It means I think you’re pretty amazing, Iggy. Even if your name is weird.”

I started to protest, but he was smiling and so close, and I took a breath and…

And this kiss was so much better than the last, if that was even possible. Maybe because it wasn’t hurried, because it wasn’t something to shut him up, to sate my greed for his attention.

Because he was all in on this one, his hands sliding to my back, fingers splayed across my bare skin as my own hands tentatively curled around his shoulders. He sighed into the kiss, and I felt us shift. For a moment, I stiffened, sure we were falling, but his grip on me tightened, and the mattress pressed against my back. “Oh,” I sighed into his mouth.

He pulled back just enough to talk. “This okay?”

I nodded. “Yes. More than. Is… is it okay for you?”

“More than,” he parroted back. He tilted his head back, capturing my jaw between his thumbs and studying my face. “This isn’t because I’ve had something to drink. Or because I’m bored. It’s because I want to. Because I want you…”

I nodded enthusiastically. “Hell yes. Same. Same, same, same.”

The next kiss was messy and hard and probably had way too much tongue, but I didn’t care.

And judging by the sounds Mathis was making into the kiss, neither did he.

Grasping his shoulders tightly, I arched against him. Both of us gasped when our dicks rubbed together. The fabric between us was both annoying and strangely erotic, a thin barrier keeping us from finally, finally touching everywhere.

Mathis was apparently on the more annoyed than aroused side when it came to that last barrier, though. He pulled away and, with an annoyed mutter, tugged his joggers down and reached for my own skimpy briefs. I barely had time to gasp before he’d sent them sailing to land somewhere near the bathroom.

“Straddle me,” he ordered roughly, already tugging me across his lap.

“I don’t have any supplies” I said. “I don’t have any STIs, but, um, I don’t… not without a condom.”

He nodded fervently. “Same. It’s fine. There’s other things. Yeah?”

“Oh god, yes.” I let him tug me into place, gasping when his fingers wrapped around our cocks. I was leaking precum copiously, something he seemed very keen about because he groaned as he slicked it over first my length, then his. Using it to make us both slick enough to feel good, he started to stroke. We weren’t that different in length, but he definitely had girth on me.

“Fuck, I want to feel you inside me one day,” I groaned, throwing my head back. He grunted, slipping his hand around my back to hold me closer, push our bodies more tightly together. It was too fast and not fast enough, both of us chasing release while wanting it to go on for ages. I couldn’t help but rock my hips into his grasp, though. Considering the way he gasped and groaned every time the head of my cock caught and pressed against his frenulum, he wasn’t going to last long, either.

My release was sudden, one moment a pleasant knot of desire and want in my stomach, spreading down my thighs. The next I was gasping and arching, eyes rolling up as Mathis pumped us harder, faster. He stiffened against me moments later, the combined slick of our releases spreading warm and sticky between us.

Mathis shifted, pulling me back into the bed so we lay tangled together, doing our best to ignore the cooling, drying jizz between us. “Good thing there’s two beds,” he finally panted. “Because I really don’t want to sleep in the wet spot. And I want to do that again in a bit…”

Chapter Eight

MATHIS

I left Iggy in the room, still sleeping, so I could get something to eat. The breakfast buffet was open, but no one else seemed to be around yet. It was just past seven in the morning, and the hotel wasn’t exactly hopping. One tired-looking person behind the check-in desk. The sound of housekeeping cleaning some of the rooms above us filtered down through the atrium. Underscored with the faint clatter of dishes being washed in the kitchen—breakfast crew clearing out for lunch, I assumed—the entire empty café area had a weirdly liminal feel. Like I shouldn’t be there or maybe like I needed to hurry on through, before the real people arrived. Christ, Mathis. Stop being weird. Get something to eat before your blood sugar makes you loopy. Just grab a container of yogurt and some juice to take back to the room, or actually sit down and have food? Take something back for Iggy, or tell him he should’ve gotten up when the alarm went off?

Paige’s voice startled me out of my decision-making process. “You totally did it.” Paige was leaning against the breakfast buffet, arms folded and smile wide.

“Why do you have to lean on everything?” I nudged past them to get a plate, pretending my face wasn’t six kinds of pink and hot.

Their smile was serene. “Part of my brand.” Their cackle, as they ducked away from my glare, told me they were fucking with me, and an odd little warmth bloomed in my chest. Stop it, Mathis. You’re not a kid. You don’t get giddy about being part of the gang and getting ribbed.

Paige grabbed a plate and loaded it up with one of everything from the steam trays on the buffet. I followed, less enthusiastic in my selection, but still coming away with a fairly big breakfast. The night before, we’d agreed not to use Raymond’s card again unless it was an emergency. Gerald was freeing up Iggy’s money, and I still had a bit left in my account so long as we didn’t go crazy. We never would’ve made it this far without the ‘help’ from the man who fucked us both over, though.

I joined Paige at the two-top they’d picked near the door and balanced my plate carefully across from their spread. The quantity of bagel, eggs, and gravy threatened to breech the biscuit dam they’d arranged. “I’m starving,” Paige muttered. “I’ve been living on questionable PB&Js for the past month while trying to get more riders. I’m stocking up while I can, so to speak.” They took a bite of the bagel and groaned appreciatively. “Objectively meh, but it’s not stale bread and dollar-store jelly.”

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