OVERTIME (18 page)

“Bullshit. There’s no maybe to it and you know it.” Colton’s fingers started tracing a hot path, beginning with the pulse at Jagger’s neck, moving lower until he found a nipple, paused long enough to seduce it with a pinch and twist, before dropping even lower, finding and stroking another pulse—this one tucked inside Jagger’s board shorts. First his finger simply traced the hard length but he quickly moved to wrapping his hand around Jagger’s throbbing cock and squeezing hard enough to cause eyelashes to flutter uncontrollably and a sweet hiss to escape between full lips. Jagger’s teeth immediately started gnawing at his bottom lip. “This excites you, Wildcat. I excite you.”

Jagger tried to knock Colton’s hand away, at least that’s what he had
intended
to do, but he ended up enclosing Colton’s hand with his own. A curse tumbled from his lips when his hand only succeeded in causing Colton’s grip to tighten.

“Fuck,” Jagger growled, sounding breathless and hating it, feeling dominated and loving it.

“Yeah, babe, we’re going to do that. Don’t you worry your pretty little head over that one,” Colton answered arrogantly. “I’m just waiting for you to stop running…and stop being afraid.”

Blue eyes flew open. “I’m not afraid,” Jagger snapped out the lie. He hadn’t been afraid of anything since his mother walked away from him, leaving him in hell all alone. Colton thought he could scare him? The guy must not have any idea what he’d seen and been through in his life. Scared of Colton?

No, he was fucking
terrified
. Colton held the power to unravel his tight control. It was like everything hung together by a tiny piece of yarn and Colton was just batting it around right now, playfully toying with him.

“I get it,” Colton continued as if Jagger had never spoken the first word. “You’ve never allowed anybody to be important to you because your life has been filled with nothing but betrayal. Your parents sucked at being parents—pretty much their most important job on this earth and they were disgraceful failures. Their mistakes and stupidity made you guard your heart to the point you never let it out to play. Fuck, babe, I’m not like them. This is me. I’ve always
wanted you. I won’t hurt you the way they did.” He took a deep breath. “I just need you to give me a chance. Let me prove how good it can be between us.”

Automatically Jagger’s head started moving side to side. His hand still gripped Colton’s hand, even as the remainder of his body tried to deny the truth and curl up inside itself, pretend he didn’t hear Colton’s beautiful words.

“You stubborn ass,” Colton said softly and then chuckled. “Head’s up, Wildcat; I’m as stubborn as you are so get ready for the fight of a lifetime. I’m not going to stop until I make you see we belong together.”

Jagger’s head banged the wall again as he continued to struggle with his own demons. His body—the body he’d always maintained a steel control over—was betraying him. Every single traitorous inch literally craved Colton’s strong, urgent touches. His mind begged that he believe Colton’s seductive words. He wanted, more than he’d ever wanted anything, to believe in Colton. He felt hope, such a foreign emotion, begin to blossom in his chest.

Stamp it down!

Shut the fuck up!

“Wh-what if I’m not even gay?”

Colton barked out a laugh. “If you’re not gay, we’ll end up just being good friends but I’m feeling pretty damned good about my odds right now.” His fingers flexed around Colton’s cock. “I might be wrong, but I’m pretty sure a straight guy wouldn’t have enjoyed my hand wrapped around his cock as much as you have.” He placed a kiss on Jagger’s lips, sucking the pouty bottom one until he forced a moan from Jagger. “A straight guy’s lips wouldn’t form the sexiest damn pout every time I look at them.” He stepped closer, nudging Jagger’s thighs further apart and positioning himself between them, trapping Jagger’s body between the brick wall and the hardness of his own body. “A straight guy, Jagger Jameson, wouldn’t
own
my heart the way you do.”

He kissed him wildly then, claiming his already kiss-swollen lips with a fierceness that probably should have scared Jagger, but only made him wild with desire. His tongue fought with Colton’s as they explored, tasted, and teased. He felt dizzy with lust. His hands, itching to explore Colton’s hard muscles, found their way under the other man’s shirt and when he touched the heated flesh, his cock threatened to explode.

He moaned.

Colton growled.

His fingertips tested the dips and valleys of Colton’s six-pack, finding the hardness intoxicating. The skin was hot and when his fingers slid across that heat, he could feel the muscles quiver in response to his exploration. Colton’s breathing was heavy as he fought to maintain some sort of control and that detail made Jagger’s cock twitch and jerk.

“Damn, Wildcat, if you keep touching me like that, I’m going to do something embarrassing like come in my pants like a teenage boy.” His hips ground against Jagger, slamming their heat together. Even through their clothes, Jagger swore he could feel every throb of both their heartbeats. Colton’s length, hard and hot, pressed against him, threatening him…luring him
…

Colton stepped away and a string of curse words that would have made a sailor proud tumbled from his lips. He was cursing wildly, but a smile curved his sexy lips as his gaze locked with Jagger. “You’re killing me right now,” he admitted. “You look so damned sexy. Those pretty blue eyes are all half-mast lazy with lust and those lips are dark red and swollen from
my
kisses. Sexier. Than. Hell.”

Jagger blushed.

“Yeah, I think we are going to be more than friends, Wildcat.” He grinned a big fat mixture of arrogance and love. “So much more than friends.” He stuck out his hand to Jagger. “Come on, let’s head back.”

As they walked back to the resort, Jagger nibbled at his bottom lip, a nervous habit he’d tried to shake for years but, clearly, had failed. Colton’s touches and promises had his body burning with the desire to submit to his own lust. He wanted to give Colton
everything
but he was terrified. The instinct to run, learned from his shitty childhood and expanded over the years, wanted to kick in and demand he put as much distance between him and Colton as possible. He wanted to run but more than that, he wanted to stay.

Stay
.

It was as if Colton was the missing portion of his life, what he’d been searching for and hiding from at the same time. He wanted to explore these new feelings, both physical and mental. The doubts and insecurities that guided the biggest portion of his life demanded he not be fooled by Colton’s pretty words or Colton’s prettier body.

The need to hold tightly to Colton, to trust him with at least his body, if not his heart, kicked in and nearly toppled him flat on his ass. Colton was perfection, beautiful to look at and even
sweeter to touch. Since he’d stepped back into his life, it was as if he couldn’t take his eyes off him. Even more intoxicating than that was the idea that Colton found him desirable. Colton was gorgeous, smart, rich, confident…all things perfect - all things opposite of him.

All the things he wanted to be.

All the things he wanted.

“Hey, Wildcat,” Colton’s sexy voice interrupted his thoughts. “Just in case you lose your mind completely and start leaning toward thinking Riley would make a better
friend
than me, you need to know your sweet Riley tossed you to the big bad wolf.”

The smile on Colton’s face should have prepared him for the direction this conversation was headed. He didn’t care; the man’s mouth was sexier than hell whether he was smirking or smiling so Jagger took the bait. “What? Go ahead. I’ll bite. How did Riley toss me to the big bad wolf?”

Colton’s smirk transformed into a full-blown-drop-your-pants-bend-over-smile. “You asked me what Riley had whispered to me that had made me smile and smooch him.”

Ah, yes, the smooch that had started it all.

“Uh…yeah. I might recall something about a whisper and a hug.” They’d reached the doors that would lead them back into the magnificent debauchery of the Island House. Jagger felt a tug of excitement sweep over him at the thoughts of going back into the resort. “And a kiss,” he added with a frown.

Colton leaned in until his lips were pressed against Jagger’s ear, just as Riley had done to him earlier. “He whispered in my ear the sweetest admission I’ve ever heard.” His tongue swiped and earlobe and then dipped inside, in and out, like he was fucking him. “He said, ‘I
never
miss a free throw’.”

Colton leaned back, crossed his arms over his chest, and grinned from ear to ear as he waited for the words to sink in.

Jagger frowned. “What?”

“Wait for it,” Colton teased. “Wait for it.”

Realization dawned on Jagger and his eyes narrowed.

“There it is!” Colton exclaimed.

“That bastard!” Jagger hissed. “That sorry-assed bastard missed on purpose?”

“Now, now, that would be illegal, Wildcat,” Colton admonished, not an inch of shame anywhere on his face. “But, hypothetically, if something like that had happened, then, yes, that sexy-assed glorious bastard missed on purpose!”

“I am so going to kick his traitorous ass,” Jagger growled, his head still reeling in shock.
Never-ever-lose Riley?

Colton answered with a husky laugh. “I am so going to name our first rescue animal after him.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“A gorgeous idiot, though, right?”

“Sure. Are you one of those people? The kind that’s always begging for compliments?”

“Definitely,” Colton winked and confirmed. “Now, are ready to head back into the den of sin?” His head nodded to the entrance of Island House. “What do you think about my little slice of paradise so far?”

Island House. It was something he couldn’t have ever imagined. Hell, he didn’t even know such places existed. He liked it. Without Colton, he would have never had the courage to visit such a place. Without Colton, he hadn’t had the courage to do much of anything in his life. He needed Colton’s strength.

“I’m not taking my clothes off,” was the only answer he was willing to give Colton.

“No, not tonight, babe,” Colton answered as he swung he door open and guided Jagger back inside. “But you are going to visit the video room because I want you to see the fuck bench right in the center of the room.” His eyes turned on Jagger, glittering with promises. “And I want you to know that one day I’ll fuck you on that center bench in front of everybody, claiming you as mine so there won’t be a doubt in anybody’s mind, especially yours.”

Jagger’s cock throbbed at Colton’s words, his mind whirling with images of Colton fucking him in front of strangers and friends. Hell, just the thought of Colton fucking him caused every nerve in his body to turn extra sensitive. He wanted it. Intimacy was something he’d always hidden from. It wasn’t the act of sex; sex, he could do. When it was merely a physical act, he could make himself perform without there being too much damage to his psyche. Could he force sex with Colton to remain on a purely physical level? He was terrified he couldn’t. The heart he had kept safely tucked away in a deep freeze had started to thaw the second Colton had waltzed back into his life, his arrogance and swagger pushing all of Jagger’s buttons. Each touch and
softly spoken word had started to clink away at the solid sheet of ice that had been formed so long ago. His ice, the numbness, was his protection and his only form of control over his life. As a child, he’d grown so accustomed to the feeling of non-feeling that he determined he would never let it go. No one would ever have control over him again…as long as the numbness remained. Colton, he feared, was going to chip it all away if he stayed much longer and when that happened, Jagger didn’t have a clue where he would end up or if he could survive.

He’d never seen a counselor or psychiatrist. No one had noticed or cared enough to recognize what was happening in his life and offer him some help, but he had studied every single book and article he could get his hands on as a way to try and understand and overcome. He recognized the symptoms in his life—the symptoms other children who lived with abuse suffered with, and, even at a young age, had become determined to not become a statistic. He would
not
turn into an abuser like his father. He would
not
allow himself to become a suicide number, even when the depression felt unbearable at times. He would
not
allow his poverty and abuse force him into that exact same lifestyle as an adult. He
would
push and push, practice and practice, do whatever was necessary to earn a scholarship so he could get an education. With a college degree, he would find a job that would allow him to walk away from his childhood forever, never looking back, never having to remember that his parents hadn’t loved him—that he hadn’t been worth loving. In order to do these things, though, there had to be sacrifices in his life. He had sacrificed his feelings, replacing it with the numbness he used to protect himself.

Numbness didn’t allow him to remember the mental and physical pain he’d endured. Numbness prevented him from feeling. Numbness protected him.

He hadn’t been numb since Colton…

He looked at the man threatening his lonely but safe existence and knew he wanted to take a risk. He just needed some help, something to give him courage and, more importantly, help him not give too much of himself. Tara Reid should do it. More alcohol. Drunk-off-his-ass. The way he saw it, if he was blitzed, his heart wouldn’t be able to come out and play.