Page 32 of A Much Younger Man
He caught my hand to steady it, and when he sipped from the spoon, our gazes locked. Everything around us disappeared, just like the first day on the beach when I’d watched him take food from Tug’s hand. His obvious enjoyment caused my heart to race and my groin to tighten—except this time the person feeding him was me.
Why, oh why did the act of feeding him smash all my boundaries?
Was it an unexplored kink?
Had food play always lurked there in the background, waiting for the right guy?
I would never have considered feeding Nick. The idea would have seemed ridiculous to both of us. But with Beck, I felt nothing weird at all, nothing out there or taboo. The contentment of feeding him—of nourishing him—was why I cared way more than I should about him.
Wait. Was it some paternal-type yearning? God no.
If it was, then I had to be the most fucked-up human ever.
I could totally envision him opening his mouth for my cock in the same way he opened for the spoon—sweetly, almost reverently, and with that implicit trust.
I gasped and let the spoon clatter to the floor between us.
“You okay?” he asked.
If I was embarrassed before, I was mortified now. “Yeah. I just realized…I forgot something at work.”
“Oh.” His gaze dropped to Callie and he laid his hand on her neck. “Okay.”
“We should set the pot on the table and serve from there if you don’t mind being informal. Can you take the salad in while I get a trivet?”
“Sure.” He picked up the bowl and carried it out with Callie plodding along after. I followed with the chili.
“This is nice.” He waited while I dished us up two big bowls.
“It is nice,” I agreed. “I don’t get a lot of company.”
“Why’s that?” He took a sip of water.
“A lot of my friends live in Southern California, and I guess I’ve developed a habit of meeting my St. Nacho’s friends in town for drinks. I don’t have a lot of free time.”
“Boop,” Rico said.
Callie didn’t pay much attention to him when he was loose, but she was interested now. She had to sniff all around his cage, and he wasn’t too happy about it.
Beck said, “Stop, Callie.”
“She can’t hurt him while he’s in his cage.”
“I don’t want her to freak Rico out.” He told Callie to lie down and she immediately went to her haunches.
“You’ll know if Rico’s worried. He’ll fluff himself up to twice his size and chatter like a monkey. He’s okay with her.” I held my hand out to his cage and he came to nibble my finger. “See? It’s all good. You should relax too.”
“Okay.” He stuck his spoon into his bowl with a chuckle.
Neither of us talked much while we ate. It wasn’t tense or anything. I didn’t feel like I had to field interesting small talk. It felt nothing like a date. Except…I was aware of his every move. Every noise he made, every clink of glassware or scrape of his spoon. And I watched him—his hands were fucking amazing. He had the most delicate wrists.
He had pushed the sleeves of his henley up to reveal pale forearms, one of which was covered with bracelets made of leather and strings with beads and a mishmash of little symbols.
They were cheap junk really, but they made his arm beautiful. I couldn’t imagine anything finer—his arms would look good in elegant watches and thick gold chains, but folk art and talismans made him seem…magical. He was spellbinding, bursting with music and kindness and so, so pretty.
It was as if he wasn’t part of the world. Just traveling through.
“Something the matter?” he asked.
