Platonic (18 page)

Daniel grins and takes a bite of the perfectly delicious dessert, the sauce just the right amount of both tart and sweet.

“I made that, though,” Mark says, motioning to the jug, and Daniel licks the back of his fingers where the sauce has dripped.

“Daniel.” Mark waits for him to finish dissolving the cake between his tongue and the roof of his mouth and swallow. “Why did you say yes to dinner?”

Daniel takes another mouthful of cheesecake and lets it dissolve even more slowly on his tongue, indulging in the taste and sucking his spoon clean as he debates.

“Daniel…” Mark is waiting, though.

“I’m trying to work that out myself.” It’s a starkly honest answer and relays the fact that Daniel hasn’t thought this through at all, that he’s unsure. He takes another bite. “Why did you ask me?” Daniel asks, genuinely curious.

“That’s unfair. I’ve been asking you all night why you came.”

Daniel holds his gaze. “You know that night in the bar, when I ran into you?” Mark tilts his head—he remembers. “You asked me to email you, and your eyes were wide and pleading, and there was no way I was going to be able to say no to you. I remember wondering if you used the same face on juries, to get your way in court. I guess what I’m saying is that I still don’t know how to say no to you. I still don’t know how anyone does.”

Time stops around them, stutters and then kicks back in when their eyes slip away from each other.

Neither one of them knows what this is or what to do with it. Neither of them walked into this dinner tonight thinking “seduction” or “relationship” or “date” or anything like that. They were far too busy
not
thinking it.

“Did you want to say no?” Mark asks.

“Of course not. I wanted to come. Of course I did, Mark.” And then somehow they’re touching. Without giving it any conscious thought, Daniel has reached across the space between them and caught one of Mark’s hands in his.

The realization that they are touching comes slowly to Mark; his nerves feel sluggish, his brain has trouble processing the simplicity of the touch, just skin on skin, not intimate or unwelcome or leading to anything. But Daniel is touching him—and not briefly, not fleetingly, he’s holding on—and suddenly it all rushes back through Mark and he never, ever wants to let go.

Not ever. This is it. Daniel is it. He always was.

“You broke my heart.” Daniel says it so simply, without any accusation or regret, and it’s too plain a fact to hurt like it used to.

“I know,” Mark tells him, holding his gaze. “I’m sorry.”

Daniel waves it off, the corner of his mouth curving up; he shakes his head and it’s nothing like every other time Mark has apologized for this. “Don’t be sorry it… it happened.” Daniel pauses, clearly waiting for Mark to smile at him. “We did our sorries and regrets back then. We said we’d be friends…” His own lips shift into a frown at that and his eyes are sad, openly sharing the regret that they didn’t manage to hold onto each other more tightly. Mark wonders what would have happened if they’d stayed friends.

“It hurt too much,” Mark admits, his throat feeling tight. “I broke my own heart, I think.”

Daniel stares at him, unreadable but so beautiful. He takes another mouthful of cheesecake and Mark tries hard not to watch his lips.

“I think it worked out well. Not the bit where I lost you,” Mark hastens to add. “But overall, I’m better now. Happier.” And it’s true. “I wasn’t happy even when I was with you, and that’s nothing to do with you. I just hadn’t finished growing up and life back home was... I hadn’t worked out what I wanted.”

“And now you know?” Daniel asks.

Nodding, Mark sounds wistful despite everything he’s said. “We were just teenagers…” Then he shakes his head, puts his spoon down on his plate and picks up his glass of wine, his eyes slipping past Daniel to a spot on the wall.

“Do you not want to talk about it?” Daniel wonders.

“I do, but not now. And not because I need to work out what happened or whose fault it was. We were young and stupid and I fucked up some-thing special—”

Daniel interrupts, “We
both
made mistakes, didn’t talk the way we should have,
we
fucked up something special.”

Mark doesn’t argue. He doesn’t see any point. “Anyway, now we’re almost thirty—”

Daniel’s eyes snap to his and he looks stricken. “Oh God, don’t say that!” he manages to scoff.

But Mark is staring at him again, and he’s not trying to keep the intensity out of his eyes or hide the storm of thoughts there. “And we are having a lovely dinner. Like… as grown-ups…” Mark trails off.
This is so a date.

“I’m leaving on Wednesday, though. For a year,” Daniel says.

Mark’s voice comes out sharper than he means it to. “You don’t have to keep telling me,” he says, and then softens when he sees a flash of hurt in Daniel’s eyes. He hasn’t seen that look for so long and he hates seeing it now just as much as he did back then. “I understood the first time and I didn’t slam the door in your face.”

“Did you want to?”

“No. I think…” It is so intense, the underlying current of wanting each other, of wanting more than a fling or settling for being friends. It’s so blatant in the space between them. But Daniel is leaving for a year, and Mark drops his gaze first and denies the obvious once more. “I think it’s time I started cleaning up.”

***

Daniel insists on helping even though there are only a half-dozen plates and hardly anything from cooking. They bring the bottle of wine over and once more slip into joking with each other, perhaps standing too close at the sink as Mark washes and Daniel dries. They take far too long with such simple tasks because they have no idea what comes next.

It feels perfect and domestic and makes Mark remember how he imagined his life in New York when he was seventeen and still had a boyfriend. They laugh and touch without meaning to, and then very much meaning to: hips bumping, dishes passing from one to the other with the fleeting brush of fingertips and eyes on each other’s hands.

It’s a small kitchen and the contact is inevitable. The wine has slowed Mark’s mind enough for him to press against the warmth of Daniel’s body for a second before he pulls back, and Daniel settles a hand on Mark’s hip as he reaches around to put the plates into the cupboard. They get tangled up reaching for something or other, and Mark is backed against the counter with Daniel so close, a hand against the wood beside his hip. He should slide out and laugh it off, and he will, but now Daniel’s other hand snaps up and brackets his body. The only way out is to ask or by force and Daniel is watching him, waiting for one or the other.

The seconds stretch, and Mark watches Daniel’s gaze flicker from his eyes to his lips and back up again. He hears and feels a shaky breath on his face, the radiant heat of Daniel’s body meeting his in the inch of air between them and ricocheting back, and surely Daniel can feel it, too? How can he stand it? Mark wants to sink to the floor and take Daniel with him and never surface for air again.

He might kiss him, he thinks. He might kiss him and ignore everything that could go wrong and just drown himself in this gorgeous, perfect man that is somehow still everything to him.

What a ridiculous thought.

Daniel’s voice, delicate and whispered just between them, stops Mark as he’s leaning in, giving in. “I said yes to dinner because you’re still my very best friend and I haven’t
seen
you in a decade and if I’d said no I don’t think I would have ever forgiven myself.”

And then Mark does kiss him. Slow and lush and so frighteningly, suddenly tangible, this slide of his lips over the curve of Daniel’s, starting just off-center as they always do and slipping into an angle and a press that feels like heaven. The nudge of noses into cheeks and the flutter of eyelashes as Mark watches Daniel close his eyes and then follows suit. The softest shift of Daniel’s mouth on his, the lightest caress, and Mark returns it in kind and then again, soft lips moving against soft lips, the scratch of stubble across his clean-shaven chin. He feels his stomach swoop and he swears he hasn’t felt like this in almost forever.

Another kiss, a little harder to see if he’ll wake up, and Daniel makes the most beautiful noise at the back of his throat, the one that will always undo Mark utterly.

Mark’s hands fly to Daniel’s face, one into his hair, his other splaying across cheek and jaw, and Daniel’s hands move to Mark’s hips, pulling him in that last inch and against him from head to toe. He makes that noise again, but louder, and Mark’s mouth opens to swallow it and kiss him some more. Meeting Daniel’s tongue and teasing, licking, tasting the same boy from a lifetime ago, but different, Mark feels every cell reignite with him.

Daniel’s hands skirt up Mark’s sides, over muscles and skin that Mark knows will feel different to him, tighter and leaner now, the skin stretched taut where he’s grown into himself. Daniel shoves him back more firmly against the counter, pressing up against him as if he’s trying to absorb him through all their contact and all their clothes. Still kissing him, Mark closes his hand into a fist in Daniel’s hair and angles his head back farther, pulling at his lips with his teeth as Daniel’s thigh pushes against his, rubbing once as if he’s about to wedge it between Mark’s legs and give him more but then settling back as Daniel just kisses him back again and again.

Mark wants desperately to kiss down Daniel’s neck, at his jaw, across his cheeks and his temples and
everywhere
. Daniel seems to want it just as much. Mark has his hand in Daniel’s hair, pulling, making him move and arch so Mark can get his lips on the angle of Daniel’s jaw, skimming, kissing, licking. Tonguing across the stubble and moaning, sucking hard enough to make Daniel gasp, “
Mark
.”

Mark’s teeth nip and his lips kiss at a spot and it’s just one spot but he wants to try everywhere and
Oh God
, Daniel will let him. Daniel’s body is hard against him but also malleable, shifting for him, arching into the contact and giving him any and all permission to keep touching. It seems like a dream to be allowed this—more than that, to have Daniel so clearly
wanting
it. And right now Daniel wants to be kissing him. He searches out Mark’s lips with his own and then takes and takes until they’re both dizzy and panting for air, pressing forehead to forehead and refusing to open their eyes as they nuzzle close and safe and warm.

Mark’s voice comes out rough and breathless and he loves the sound of it, loves the way it makes Daniel smile, his eyelashes fluttering as he stays there, inches from his face. Mark says his name twice, trying to regain some semblance of grounding even though he won’t let this pure happiness slip away for even a second. He ducks back in for another kiss and says Daniel’s name again as he pulls their lips apart. “Daniel,” he swallows and Daniel opens his eyes, still smiling, just so he can press the chastest of kisses to the side of Mark’s Adam’s apple and feel the movement when he inevitably swallows and says it again. “
Daniel
.”

His hands are on Daniel’s hips, shaking so much Daniel must be able to feel the tremors and
God this is perfect.
Mark is happy, breathless when he asks, “What are we doing?”

CHAPTER 10

Daniel’s breath comes out in a half-laugh, half-sigh, and he buries his face in the crook of Mark’s neck once again, pressing his mouth there and kissing and licking as though he is trying to get a taste. He mumbles, “I don’t know,” clearly wishing he didn’t have to think about it. If they were a little bit drunker, Mark thinks, they could just topple into bed and not have to talk right now. “I don’t know, but I want to.” Daniel pulls back and places a hand over each of Mark’s cheeks, staring hard at him.

It’s been a decade and then just friends and now everything,
everything,
all so agonizingly slow and yet too fast to keep track of. And London, goddamn London.

If it weren’t for London, this would be a date and there would be one hot, hungry kiss to end the night and leave them both wanting. More dates and then some important discussions and more kisses, as many kisses as they wanted, and sex, lots of sex, and then weekends together. Eventually, maybe, they would get bored with so much sex (though Mark doubts it) and take the leap, move in together and find it too easy. Forever would seem so easy.

Except London is a thing that is happening.

“I don’t know, Mark.” Daniel kisses him on the mouth and almost,
almost
, falls back into it. “But if we stop because we’re scared, I’ll hate myself for it.”

“Daniel, I…” Mark’s eyes flicker down to Daniel’s mouth and then back up. His hands on Daniel’s waist tighten and flex and he can see hope in Daniel’s eyes.

They’re tipsy on wine and lust and the magnetism that they’ve both felt since that first time Mark kissed Daniel and got it right. But they’re both also more sober now than they’ve ever been.

Being almost thirty will do that.

It will beg the question:
What if we don’t?

“Please say yes,” Daniel says, his fingers tracing the lines of Mark’s face just in case Mark is about to say no. His eyes have gone glassy with the threat of tears but he’s smiling and God, this feels like a moment—
the moment.
Daniel swallows hard and Mark’s fingers stretch farther, from the dip of Daniel’s back a little lower to the curve of his ass. “Please
mean
yes.”

“Daniel…” Is there really any question? “
Always
.” It’s so fierce and so true and Mark captures his mouth just as Daniel gasps, kissing him as deeply as he knows how, dragging him close with his hands, sliding to grab at his ass and hauling him forward and grinding against him and—oh,
yes
—this is the heady, dizzying feel of them
together.
Hip to hip, chest to chest, mouth to mouth and everything caught between. Their cocks are getting hard quickly; all of it obvious and unabashed. They do not let even an inch of air disrupt the close contours of their pressed-together bodies.