Page 25 of High Notes & Hail Marys

Sterling smiles crooked, just one side of his mouth turning up. “That’s very noble of you, Kai.”

“Yeah, well. I’m a noble guy.”

“I like that about you.” He takes a step forward, so you two are standing closer. “Lately, though. I’ve been wondering…”

You lean out and cup his elbows with your hands. Lightly. Taking a step even nearer, so there’s just a breath between your bodies. “Mm-hmm?”

“I’ve been wondering what you’re like when you’re not as noble.” When Sterling looks up, his blue eyes have gone dark.

You’re only touching his upper arms, his elbows sharp against your palms, but your fingers are itchy where they touch the nubbly knit of his sweater. Underneath it, the warmth of his skin is bleeding through. “How, umm, not-noble are we talking about here?”

He laughs, and it’s low. Smokey. “How about we just get going, and I promise that I’ll tell you if I don’t like it?”

Caution flickers through your caveman brain, cutting through the thick, soupy haze of arousal.Careful. You have to be careful.“Yeah,” you hear yourself saying. “That sounds good.”

Sterling pushes up on his toes, and your hands are already in the perfect position to support him as he slants his mouth against yours. Your eyes drift closed. When your lips touch, he surges against you, pressing his torso and hips into you. Almost immediately, your dick springs to attention, and you groan against his mouth. A smile breaks over his face, one that you feel rather than see as your tongue traces its outline. He opens up for you, and you explore the hot cavern of his mouth, the points of his sharp little teeth. Your hands under his arms tighten incrementally. He’spushingyou like he wants to get inside your skin. His arms wrap around your neck, and one of his hands fuzzes your scalp. You could die happy like this, you think, kissingthisperson as the contrast between the cold night air and the heat of the crackling fire hit you in alternating currents.

“On the bed,” he murmurs.

It’s just a few steps before you two are stretched out on the soft duvet. You laugh a little as Sterling haphazardly throws pillows on the floor—there arejust that many.Little ones and big ones. Even after five or six get chucked, there’s still a couple for you to rest your head on as you lie on your side. Sterling cozies right up beside you, his head on the same level as yours, his cold toes pressing into your shins. In the breadth of a second, you are kissing again.

You pull him closer with one arm over his back. The other hand, you tangle in his hair because you literally dream of doing that sometimes. His strands are silky between your fingers, the curls tangled by the wind on the Cliff Walk. Sterling gets adventurous, running his hand up the length of your side from your hip to your underarm. Then he pushes your t-shirt up and repeats the movement against your bare skin. Goosebumps break out under the path of his hand, and not just because his fingers feel like little blocks of ice.

Using the hand in his hair, you (gently) tilthis head back and start mouthing his jawline. Without being told, you can guarantee that he doesn’t want you to leave marks. So you use just your lips, no teeth, and press hot kisses down the side of his face, dipping into the hollow behind his ear, and make your way down his neck. He whines a little and shifts when you meet the spot where his shoulder starts, so you linger there. Sterling isn’t being shy about feeling you up under your shirt, his hand tracing your pectorals and abs and outlining the waistband of your shorts. You’re hard inside of them, and trying not to make that obvious, but then Sterling throws his leg over your hip. You freeze up a little, and he must feel it, because he pets your stomach and kisses your forehead.

“It’s okay,” he says quietly. “Everything is okay. Don’t stop.”

The permission makes you groan, a rumble deep in your chest. Sterling lifts his head a little.

“Can I take your shirt off?”

You don’t wait for him to do it, pulling it over your head by the back of the collar and throwing it on the floor. He chuckles a little at your impatience, but pulls off his sweater as well. This, he drapes over the foot of the bed before scooting right back into the same position he was in before. Your chests are skin-to-skin, and your cock is pressed into the crook of his hip, throbbing hard eventhough the layers of both your bottoms. You’re not sure if it’s the wine or this unprecedented closeness to Sterling, but you are feeling a little lightheaded. You try to ground yourself with the immediacy of your lips on his collarbones, the tiniest tang of salt on his skin. Pressing your hand against his chest, you can feel his heartbeat goingfast-fast-fast.There’s a play of muscle and sinew when you touch him, of him arching into your touch. You are focused on the moment, on the taste and touch and sounds of the moment, when Sterling gets his hand between your bodies and palms your dick. You almost shoot up off the mattress.

“FuckingChrist,” you mutter.

There’s a flush on Sterling’s cheeks, a pretty pink that trails down his chest. “You’re huge,” he comments. “Figured you had to be.”

“Warn a guy,” you reply. It sounds like a complaint, but you are trying not to fuck his hand through all the layers of clothes between you two.Sterling Grayson has his hand on your cock.The room is spinning slightly. All of a sudden, all you can feel is the crackling fire. It’s inside your veins. It’s entirely too warm in the room. Sterling’s eyes are all pupils in the low light, his mouth slightly open. You focus on trying not to squeeze him too tight as he continues his exploration, rubbing the length of your shaft over your shorts.

“Do you like to top or bottom?” he asks.

“Huh?” It’s the most coherent reply you are capable of, as any brains you possessed ten minutes ago are currently leaking out of your dick.

“With sex,” he clarifies. He twists his wrist, and it makes his hand swivel around your girth. Fuck restraint. Your hips start to move, only as little as you can manage, but you are thrusting into his hand. Sterling goes with it. “Top or bottom?”

“Uhh.” Answering the question seems unfathomable. “Depends.”

Itdoesdepend. It depends on the person, the place, the feeling, and any number of shifting, interrelated variables specific to the moment in question. Happily, Sterling doesn’t press for clarification.

“Me too,” he says. “I consider myself vers.”

You are half-ready to tell him that you’d consider yourselfanything he wantedif it meant that he would just stop teasing you. Your boxer briefs are sticky with pre-cum, and the friction of Sterling’s hand is starting to fall on the wrong side of the pleasure-pain line.

“I don’t think we’re going to worry about that tonight, though,” he says.

You have already forgotten what he’s talkingabout. Oh. Penetration. Worrying about different types of sex seems an ocean away compared to your certainty that you are about to embarrass yourself and come in your pants.

“Can I… can we take our clothes off?” you ask desperately. “We don’t have to. But if it’s okay, I mean…”

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