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Trisha had really gone all out. Her apartment always looked like a showplace, but tonight it bloomed with flowers. The lights were turned down, a low voice crooned pretty words from hidden speakers, and the table sparkled with delicate china and long stem crystal.
Look in the oven, a note on the counter read. Carson pulled open the oven door to find a casserole simmering inside.
“She left us her baked ziti,” he told Seth. That stuff was legendary. A little garlicky for a wedding night, maybe, but legendary.
“And a bottle of wine,” Seth said, turning it over in his hands. “Red. To go with the ziti, I guess.”
Neither one of them was much of a wine drinker, but a wedding night was a wedding night. Carson popped the cork and filled their glasses, but not very high. Important stuff needed to happen tonight—stuff they should be sober for. Seth seemed to be on a different page, because he downed his serving in a single swallow and came up sputtering.
“It’s not tequila,” Carson told him. “You’re supposed to sip it.”
“I’ll sip the next one.” Seth filled his glass to the top this time.
“You really don’t want to be here, do you?” He put his own glass down dispiritedly. He’d been wondering if he and Seth could be more than friends, but the answer was obviously no. Seth wouldn’t even entertain the possibility. “I’ll just go.”
“Who says you have to go?”
“You’re clearly uncomfortable. Dammit, Seth. We used to be friends. This whole thing is such a mess.” He moved into the living area of Trisha’s apartment and plopped himself down on one end of her plush purple couch. Its cushions swallowed him up like a giant lavender hug, but they didn’t bring him any comfort. He dropped his head into his hands and tried to stem the sorrow welling up in him.
“You okay?” Seth sat down next to him, the cushions dipping with his weight. He put a hand on Carson’s shoulder and rubbed lightly.
“I will be.”
“I didn’t know you were so invested in this.” Seth took a drink from the glass in his hand, then parked it thoughtfully on the coffee table in front of him. “It was my harebrained idea.”
“I guess I bought into it.”
It’d seemed like a chance—like a good solution to their financial situation and an opportunity for the two of them to find out if there was anything between them other than friendship. Sometimes he thought Seth was attracted to him, but right now he felt about as attractive as a wad of used chewing gum.
“But I guess it’s not going to work.”
“So we’re agreed,” Seth said. “No fake marriage.”
“No fake marriage.” He stuck out his hand, and Seth shook it. Then he pulled the certificate from the breast pocket of his suit and went over to the candles Trisha had set out for them and set it on fire, letting it burn down in his hand until the heat hurt his fingers as much as the rejection hurt his heart. He dropped the remains in the sink, then slid the ring he’d bought only yesterday off his finger. It’d had a short run.
Seth took his off too and they lined them up next to each other on the counter. Seth’s hadn’t fit anyway. His fingers were longer and thinner than Carson’s, so graceful when he used them on stage, gesturing to match his words. Carson wanted to grab them and kiss them and beg Seth to give the two of them a shot, but he’d already pushed too hard. If he kept at it, he wouldn’t even end up with Seth as a friend.
“We’re still rich,” he said with a little laugh.
“You said a million dollars wasn’t rich.”
“Rich enough, I guess.” He reminded himself how amazing it was going to be to take a few years to concentrate on his craft, but the money felt like a consolation prize.
“So then how do we handle this?” Seth asked.
“The way we should’ve in the first place. We claim the money as two friends who bought a ticket together and trust each other to be fair if one of us makes it big and the other doesn’t. I wouldn’t want anything you were forced to give me anyway.”
“Same.” Seth clapped him on the back, and Carson clapped Seth on his, and they moved into one of those bro hugs where they were practically beating on each other.
Seth’s body felt so good against his—warm and firm. It reminded him of the kiss they’d almost shared earlier, right before Trisha had interrupted them. For a moment, he’d thought Seth was into it. His pupils had been so huge, his expression so anticipatory. Carson had been one stolen second away from thoroughly claiming him.
He pulled back now, slowly separating their bodies, to find Seth wearing that same expression.
“Seth?”
Seth cupped the side of his face, stroking a thoughtful thumb over his cheekbone. “You never did kiss me. Not really.” He leaned forward, coming up on his toes so their mouths aligned. Carson grabbed him to steady him, as if Seth were fragile or clumsy. Seth can stand on his own two feet was the last thought he had before their mouths connected.
The kiss Seth gave him was as light as the one they’d shared outside the phonebooth, as brief and as chaste. It wasn’t the kiss he’d have given Seth if he’d had one more minute to do it, but here they were—alone, lit by candles and serenaded by music, dressed in their best suits. And so he did what he’d been on the verge of doing before: he opened his mouth and took.
Seth’s head dropped back from the force of his assault, but his body pressed forward. His hands clutched and grabbed at Carson’s arms, bruising through the thick material of his suit. A sound came up from the back of his throat that Carson wanted more of, so he dove in deeper, plumbing the recesses of Seth’s mouth with his tongue. His hands worked down Seth’s torso, finding his ass and using it to pull him in tight, and there—
God. Carson drew his head back, madly inhaling the oxygen his starved system needed. “You’re hard.” He pushed his hips forward again, checking.
“So are you.” Seth bumped back.
“I thought you didn’t find me attractive.”
“When did I ever say that?”
“You didn’t want to be married to me,” Carson reminded him. They’d just taken off their rings and burned their marriage certificate.
“I didn’t want to be fake married to you. And I never said I didn’t want to have sex with you.”
“So, wait. Let me get this straight. You do want to have sex with me?”
Seth eased himself away. He shoved his hands in his pockets and fixed Carson with a calculating stare. “Do you want to have sex with me?”
“Obviously. It was my idea, remember? Married people have sex? Same bed? Stay faithful, keep each other satisfied? Any of that ringing a bell?”
Seth shook his head, and Carson, whose hopes had risen, felt them fall again.
“That’s just you being practical,” Seth said. “What about now, when we’re not married? Do you want to have sex with me now?”
“Yes, I want to have sex with you now. Boner.” He pointed to his pants, even though there wasn’t actually still a boner in them. There would be if Seth plastered himself all over him again.
“That was for me?”
Carson threw up his hands. “Who else would it be for?”
“It’s just— I’ve waited a long time for that. I never thought—”
“You’ve been waiting?” Carson smacked his head. Could they really have been so stupid? “Seth, come here.” He held out his hand and Seth tentatively took it. He used it to draw Seth back into his arms where he belonged. “Let’s try this again.”
This time there was no hesitation. He knew how Seth’s mouth felt against his—the light rasp of stubble along his upper lip and the warm sweep of his tongue—and he dove into it hungrily. Seth responded with a matching eagerness, all limbs now as he worked to get Carson’s jacket off his shoulders.
“We have way too many clothes on for this,” Carson said, breaking their kiss to wrestle his jacket the rest of the way off. “And also, we’re in a kitchen.”
“But we have a bed.” Seth propelled him to the bedroom where Trisha had outdone herself. They paused in the doorway to appreciate the fluffy pink duvet turned back to reveal white satin sheets covered in red rose petals. “Holy shit.”
“Leslie is a lucky person,” Carson observed as he divested himself of the rest of his clothes.
“You sure about this?” Seth asked, seeming unsure himself again.
This back and forth was going to kill him. He stopped unbuttoning his shirt to fix Seth with a questioning look.
“This—” Seth gestured to the bed. “It’s romantic. You’re romantic. You don’t like having sex with someone you don’t know.”
“I’ve known you for twelve years. And as far as your horndog energy goes, I’ve got no problem with it as long as it’s directed at me.”
“It’s always been directed at you.” Seth came over and finished undoing his buttons for him. “That’s something I should probably tell you. This isn’t just about getting laid to me. It’s not pretend, and it’s not temporary. That’s why I couldn’t—”
“I’m so glad you didn’t,” Carson assured him. “New plan. First, we try being boyfriends, then we get married.”
“I like that plan.”
“Then I’d like you naked.” Because so far it was all him getting naked. He shucked off his pants, leaving nothing but the boxers beneath him, then stretched out on Trisha’s bed to watch Seth put on a show for him. Not only could Seth act, he could dance. And, apparently, strip.
Carson whistled and applauded as one piece after another came off until Seth made it down to his briefs, which were bridal white and very skimpy. Then Seth crawled up over him on the bed and joined their mouths together again.
They rolled back and forth—somewhere in between the way he and Allie used to make out and the way he and Seth used to wrestle. It was everything he’d ever wanted, as good as he’d known it would be. Sexual attraction, friendship, and an emotion he could only call love teaming up to send him flying higher than he’d ever flown before.
He couldn’t wait to get his hands on Seth’s cock. Seth put more effort into staying fit than he did, and he’d appreciated all that effort before, was appreciating it even more now that he was actually touching it, but the pièce de ré·sis·tance was still covered—easy to feel, but hard to see.
Hard. Heh heh.
“What’s funny?” Seth asked, and Carson almost told him because Seth would appreciate the joke, but he didn’t want to derail what they had going on, so he just tugged down on Seth’s briefs until his cock sprang free.
“Holy shit,” he muttered at the sight of how nicely Seth’s grower turned into a shower. “You’re gonna fuck me with that?”
Seth stopped trying to tackle him. “Why, do you want me to?”
“Yeah. Little bit.” He was absolutely fascinated by the prospect. He’d experimented with his own fingers, but this would be different. Seth’s cock was nice. Fat and very hard.
Seth twisted his head around, searching the room for something. “Shit. Trisha thought of everything except condoms and lube. She probably figured we’d bring our own.”
“You don’t have any?”
“I suppose you think I just run around with condoms and lube in my pocket?”
Carson did think that.
“All right, sometimes I do. But not when I’m wearing a suit and getting married to my best friend.” Seth sat up and rested in his chin in his hand. “Fuck me sidewise. This is so not how I saw this day going.”
Carson couldn’t help laughing at how put-out Seth was. This was definitely not how either of them had imagined the day going. Or the week. Or the next few years. But it was amazing. He was in bed with his best friend, his almost-husband, his co-owner in a million dollars. Joy rolled out of him in helpless peals of semi-hysterical laughter. It was all just so fucking funny. Seth held out for about thirty seconds before he started laughing too.
“So now what?” Carson asked when they’d laughed themselves into exhaustion and were lying next to each other, naked and still somehow hard on their puffy pink not-wedding bed.
“Now I introduce you to blowjobs.”
“Like I’ve never had a blowjob. Allie and I were together for five years. You don’t think she ever blew me?”
“Not like this.”
Seth was right, as it turned out. He brought a skill to the task that’d been honed by more practice than Carson cared to think about and an enthusiasm Allie had been missing. In fact, he’d never known it was possible to be so enthusiastic about sucking someone’s dick, but if he’d had any doubts left about whether or not Seth really had the hots for him, they were burned away by the intensity with which Seth went at it.
Seth had him on his back, with his knees up and pushed out to the sides. It was a vulnerable position, but one that gave Seth access to a lot of territory Allie had never bothered to investigate. Like his balls and the skin behind them. Even the virgin pucker of his ass.
“I’m so going to enjoy getting in here,” Seth said.
Carson figured Seth meant with his dick, but a second later, Seth proved him wrong by getting in there with his tongue—an intimate and enlightening preview of what Carson hoped would happen very soon, but for now he enjoyed all the places Seth was willing to put his mouth.
The sight of his best friend’s head between his legs did funny things to his stomach. And to his heart. It was like winning the lottery all over again—surprising and amazing and life-changing.
By the time Seth stopped screwing around with all those parts of him that’d never received any affection before and turned his full attention to his cock, his cock had just about had it. It took embarrassingly little to make him come, and he ejaculated about a gallon of backlog.
“Well?” Seth’s smug face turned up to him. His tongue came out to lick around his lips as he contemplated Carson like he was waiting for a goddamned trophy.
“It was okay,” Carson said, because they’d been friends too long for him to give Seth praise without giving him shit too. “Can you teach me to do that?”
“First lesson begins in three, two, one—” Seth jumped him, rolling them both across the bed until Seth ended up on his back. He gave Carson’s shoulders a suggestive thump, and Carson slid down until he came face to face with Seth’s cock, still rock hard and still the most handsome cock he’d ever seen, in porn or anywhere.
A little bit of a mystery though. “What happened to the lessons?”
“Just suck it,” Seth said, giving him an encouraging push in the right direction. “I don’t want you to be too good at it yet. It’s part of the fantasy.”
“What fantasy?”
“Turning my straight best friend gay for me.”
Carson opened his mouth to argue with the straight part, then changed his mind. Let Seth have his fantasy. “So gay for you,” he agreed.
He put his mouth over the head of Seth’s cock and sucked it in. It was big and firm, a little salty. Seth’s pubes were trimmed back, and Carson thought maybe he should do some manscaping himself because it made sliding as far down Seth’s shaft as his throat could manage pleasantly hair-free. The skin of Seth’s sack was soft against his fingers, loose and wrinkled, but the more Carson sucked, the tighter his balls got, and he knew what that meant. It meant he was doing a good job.
Seth thrashed a bit, like he wanted to buck up and take control, but he didn’t force any more of himself down Carson’s throat than he could handle, and when he was about to come, he mumbled a warning in plenty of time for him to pull off. He didn’t though. He wanted this, had wanted it for quite a while.
It was hard to say where life was going to take the two of them over the next few years, but he sure liked where life had him right now—glowing with orgasmic bliss, swallowing his best friend’s load, and about to embark on the greatest adventure of his life.