Page 55 of The King of Halloween
Raj’s eyes widened in both fear and excitement. “Ghosts?”
“Worse. Mascots. At least a dozen from old schools. People say if you linger too long, the head of a Viking will roll off a shelf and chase you out of the building.” Adam tried to keep a straight face at his nonsense, but then Raj had to twist his lips to the side in thought and give a hard laugh.
Kiss him before he realizes you’re full of it.
Adam turned his head to the right, his eyes slipping closed. The heat of Raj’s cheek brushed down his nose, and he leaned closer.
“Ah!” The massive pumpkin head swept a shelf clean, sending a dozen boxes careening to the floor. Adam raced to protect the head, certain the Jaycees would ritually sacrifice him if he broke this one. What he didn’t expect was the pair of arms slipping around his chest from behind. He was pulled off his feet until he rested against a coiled body.
Raj panted against Adam’s ear. He held a hand out like he was about to swat at a ghost. Warmth trickled down Adam’s spine at having someone leap to protect him, even if it was from old Peter Pan costumes.
“That was my doing,” Adam said. “Well, this thing’s mostly.” He patted the head to explain and tried to crane his gaze back. It was hard to make out Raj in the low light, but he certainly knew the palm pressing into his stomach and the forearm binding him back.
“You’re sure it’s not a ghost?”
“I can never be sure. For all I know, ghosts are watching all the time. Maybe the afterlife is nothing more than a pervy peep show.”
Raj chuckled, but his breath was still coming out quickly. Leaning back, Adam could feel his heart pounding away so hard his quickened to match.
Balancing the pumpkin head halfway on the shelf, Adam strained to run his fingers back through Raj’s hair. “Why don’t we give…” As he molded around Raj’s chest, savoring every soft curve that fit against his slim body, the most intriguing bone of all pressed against Adam’s ass. His brain burst with tiny vignettes of all the ways he wanted to suck and pull on that cock.
Raj shifted, a barely held gasp puffing against the back of Adam’s ear. It was so hot that Adam nearly turned around to leap on him. Then his cock had to go and wiggle its way against Adam’s butt crack.
Damn it.
Adam jerked, tearing himself away from the discussion he didn’t want to have. Unfortunately, it also pulled him out of Raj’s arms, leaving the man staring at him in confusion. “Why don’t we…?” Adam hunted for an eject button out of this awkwardness. Leaping to the pumpkin king’s aid, he scooped up the head. “…put this away, then try to resuscitate this date?”
Nodding, Raj fell in behind Adam, who did his best to not notice the man adjusting himself below the belt. “Do we have a lot farther to go?”
“I think we have to hang a right at broken dreams, then a left past diva boulevard before arriving at our destination.” As Adam explained, he guided them around the racks.
“You seem to know this place well…” Raj said so diplomatically, it made Adam’s teeth hurt.
“By which you mean ‘you must have been a theater kid.’” At last, he found the stand for the pumpkin head. They’d only need it for one more parade, the big one, then it could return to its yearly slumber. After placing it down, making certain it was level, and centering the face, Adam turned back to Raj. “The answer is yes, but not in the way you think.”
“Really? You didn’t have big stage dreams? Traipsing the boards? Something with the footlights?”
Adam ran his fingers over the array of prosthetics lying on the table for A Midsummer Night’s Dream. “I spent a lot of time back here as a kid, carting costumes for my father.” His easy smile turned doleful, the past shaking its angry chains at him. A first date was not the time to ruminate on a dead parent. “Lots of old seamstresses who’d pinch my cheeks and give me butterscotch discs for being a good boy. Of course, then they’d find half-licked candy stuck to the costumes and chase me out with a broom.”
That caused Raj to laugh, either at the image or realizing Adam was trying to dance away from pain. Placing a finger to his chin, Adam stared Raj up and down as the man took in the costumes. “What about you? Did you ever want to be…” Adam pulled out a random costume, stared at it twice, then smiled. “Dorothy?”
Luckily, Raj chuckled. “No. I can’t stand talking in front of five people at a meeting. Having to do it on a stage before a hundred…”
“More like five hundred,” Adam interrupted, causing Raj to pale.
He shook his head at the thought and placed a hand to his chest. “I’d die on the spot. Heart attack, the second the curtain rose.”
“That would be a travesty.”
Someone’s fingers drew down Raj’s open coat, toying with the zipper while biting his lip. As the friction burn caught up with his brain, Adam jerked to realize it was him. “Ah, why don’t we have a little look around? There’s all kinds of costumes here.”
“Didn’t you want to head out?” Raj asked.
Yes, to have a normal date that ends with a normal kiss, where they go back to their normal beds and jerk off thinking about what could have been. It was supposed to go slow, to be real and romantic. But the longer he was near that man, the harder it was for Adam to keep his hands anywhere other than that sweater.
“Come on,” Adam said with a challenging laugh. “This is your one chance to be whoever you want in the theater.”
Raj dropped his hands and nodded. “Okay. That…”
