Monster mash, p.17
Monster Mash, page 17
Some deep part of me was still panicking. I didn’t know what to do in this situation, or how to respond. I liked what was happening, but it was new and new things were terrifying. What if he was getting bored? Why was he being so slow and tender with me? Was this how he always was or was it special treatment because he thought I was fragile? I didn’t want him to think I was fragile, but I didn’t want him to stop either, even if I was a little scared.
“Ezra,” he murmured and kissed my chin. “Stay with me.”
“I am with you,” I insisted, though it was only half true. To convince him, I cupped his cheek. “I’m right here with you,” I said and brought his lips back to mine.
It would have been easy to slip into my own head again, to worry about what he thought of me, what was going to happen, to imagine the thousands of different ways this could all go so terribly wrong. I forced myself not to, focusing on the softness of Matteo’s lips, the gentle caresses of his hands moving down my ribcage, the tickle of fur on his stomach and legs, the intoxicating way his tongue played with mine…
Somewhere along the way, I’d gotten hard again and started to lift my hips to thrust against him, desperate for any friction. He cruelly denied me anything but more kisses and teasing touches.
I let out a protesting whine. “Matteo, quit teasing me.”
“I’m savoring you, not teasing you.”
“Well, I want you inside me now.” I slid a hand around to grip his ass, trying to pull him toward me, but there was no way I’d move him, not if he didn’t want to be moved.
Matteo chuckled and slid down my body, leaving a trail of more teasing kisses. “All right, Sugar. But I’ve got to get you ready first.”
“Hurry up,” I complained.
Matteo sat up and looked around the room before rubbing a hand over one of his horns. “Damn.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I left the bag with the condoms out in the car.” He gave me an apologetic glance. “I kind of wasn’t expecting to get invited in.”
“Fuck the condoms,” I blurted, growing more frustrated by the minute. “I’m negative for everything and on PrEP. Tested three weeks ago. You?”
“Same. Tested last month. All good there, but…It could get messy.”
“I’ll wash the damn sheets.” I opened the bedside table, grabbed the bottle of lube I kept there and tossed it to him. “If you make me wait any more, I’m going to run out of curse words to mutter at you.”
He grinned and popped open the bottle. “I hope not, because it’s going to take me a hot minute to stretch you out enough to take me.”
My disappointed groan turned into a moan of pleasure when he pushed a slicked-up finger into me. When he added a second, my head fell back against the pillows. “Oh, Jesus fuck…”
“Aw, now you can do better than that. Give me a new one, Sugar,” Matteo teased, pumping his fingers in and out of me slowly.
I bit my lip, refusing to give him what he wanted at first, but I couldn’t take it. He was moving his fingers torturously slow. It was maddening! “Quit taking the piss and fuck me already, Matteo! Please!”
“I don’t think I will,” he mused.
I gasped and gripped the blankets in my fists as he carefully added a third finger. On instinct, my knees shot further toward my chest, as if that would somehow make it easier. It didn’t. I didn’t know whether to cry, curse, or moan at the careful way he was gently forcing me open.
“Relax for me, Sugar,” he cooed softly.
“Matteo, please! I’m ready!”
I didn’t know if that was true, but I also didn’t think I was going to last much longer. Once the initial slight burn of the stretch faded, it felt so amazing, I could barely think. That was what I wanted, what I needed, maybe more than anything I’d ever needed from him before.
“All right, all right.”
My whole body sagged with a mixture of relief and disappointment when he pulled his hand free of me, but it was short-lived. I tensed again when he lined the thick head of his cock up with my entrance. God, I hoped I was ready.
Matteo shifted his weight over me, hovering over me while he added more lube before inching in ever so slightly. I lifted my hands from the bed, needing something more substantial to hold on to. I found his forearms and our eyes met as I dug my fingernails into his fur.
“Breathe for me, Sugar,” he whispered. “Just keep breathing.”
Everything in me screamed that I should do the opposite, hold my breath and brace myself while he breached me.
Matteo cupped my cheek and I let out a slow breath. “That’s it, Sugar. Keep breathing for me. I’m going to go slow. You don’t have to do anything but breathe and focus on you. If it gets to be too much, you tell me and we’ll stop.”
I didn’t want to stop. Even as intense as the stretch was, something deep down in me told me I could do this. I needed to do it.
So, I held onto Matteo, and I breathed.
The slow push of his body into mine banished every thought from my head. For a moment, it was as if I’d somehow slid out of my body, the sensations both all-encompassing and distant. I tried to focus on something, anything, that would ground me. The feel of Matteo’s flesh and fur under my fingers, the sweat sliding down my temples, the texture of the sheets…
Matteo pulled back slightly, and the pressure lessened, but only for a moment before he tried again, this time getting a little further, and a little further the next time. “That’s it, Sugar. You’re doing so good. You’re doing such a good job taking me. Just keep breathing.”
His weight shifted, one hand coming to rest on the mattress near my head.
My eyes snapped back open. When had they closed? I couldn’t recall, but they were open again, and we were staring at each other with an intensity that I’d never shared with anyone else. Like we were looking into each other’s souls.
It was too much, and I had to break it. My eyes fluttered closed. Something in me released, and every muscle seemed to relax at once. Matteo let out a groan as he sank in the last inch and he waited there a moment, giving me time to adjust.
A shuddering sigh escaped my lips. I hooked my ankles loosely against the dimples in his lower back and he started to move.
I’d never felt so full before, like there was no room in me anymore for anything other than Matteo. No space for worry or fear or endless anxiety. He’d pushed it all out to fill me with him.
Matteo intertwined his fingers with mine and kissed me while he moved inside me with deep, passionate thrusts. He held me down, but I was weightless beneath him. Even when he released one of my hands to grip my hip, I didn’t move it, afraid to break the spell he’d cast with his touch.
This wasn’t the meaningless sex I’d had before. It wasn’t a quick race to bliss, or a half-hearted attempt at connecting with someone outside of me. This was something else. Something more.
“Matteo,” I whispered, wanting to ask him if he felt it too, this swell of something. But even words had gone out of reach.
I can’t do this. I can’t feel this. It’s too much, too soon. And yet I heard myself asking for more. “Fuck, yes. More like that. Fucking hell…”
Matteo’s nostrils flared and his eyes were all heat as he looked down between our bodies where my cock was leaking onto my stomach. “Touch yourself.”
“Fuck,” I muttered again and did as he ordered, trying to time the movements of my hand with his thrusts.
“That feel good, Sugar?”
Good didn’t begin to cover it, not with him inside of me, filling me so full I thought I might burst right open. I nodded, feeling half-drunk.
“Yeah? I like watching you like this. So close to coming undone, so completely out of control.”
He was right. Even if I didn’t feel out of control, I knew I was. I’d given him all the power and somehow felt better for it.
My head tipped back. “Please, Matteo…”
“Please what, Sugar? What do you need?”
I whimpered. “I need you to come in me. Fill me up. I need to feel it. Oh, fuck…you feel so good. I just…I need…” My babbling ended in a surprised curse as my orgasm rushed up on me.
Matteo swore too, hips stuttering as I painted my stomach with cum. I felt him swell and start to pulse inside of me. Somewhere distant, it registered that I should expect something, but the sudden rush of wetness was a surprise. More of it splashed out of me and onto the bed when he thrust in again. Holy shit, there was so much cum, I was literally overflowing with it. It was everywhere, dripping down my thighs, coating my balls, soaking the bed… And it just kept coming.
I groaned, enjoying the sensation way more than I thought I would. It was one thing to be filled to the brim with his cock, and another thing entirely to be so full of his cum that it was literally spilling out of me. If I hadn’t already come twice before, I’d have been rearing and ready to go a second time.
“Fuck, Matteo,” I managed when he’d finally collapsed next to me.
“Sorry,” he muttered, still catching his breath.
“No, no. That was bloody brilliant. Hot, even.”
“I can get a towel if you tell me where they are,” he offered.
“In a minute.” I rolled onto my side, ignoring all the wet spots in favor of settling my head against his chest. “Just let me lie here a spell and enjoy it.”
He chuckled and put an arm around me. “You must be really out of it. Your accent’s getting thicker.”
“I’m bloody knackered, is what I am.” I yawned and squirmed closer.
Matteo tightened his arm around me and kissed the top of my head. While I laid against him, he ran his fingers lightly over my skin, the touch almost as pleasant as the orgasms that had come before it. It was nice to have someone in my bed that didn’t want to just fuck and fuck off right after for once.
An orgasm, a gentle massage and the soft tap of rain against the windows… This must be what heaven’s like. “You keep rubbin’ my back, I might have a wee kip,” I said, using the same silly old talk my mom used to tease me with. No one really talked like that in Ireland except old people and country folk, maybe. No one I knew.
“I don’t mind.”
I opened my eyes and looked up at him. “You won’t leave if I do?”
“No,” he said and pulled me closer, kissing the top of my head again. “Take a nap. Then let’s get some takeout and watch something.”
Netflix and chill. I smiled and closed my eyes. That was so Matteo.
Life was full of defining moments, and they were never when you expected them to be. Take, for example, the day I decided to open Beefcakes. I’d been walking down the street with my cousins, just talking shit, doing nothing in particular. We walked by that bakery, and it just hit me. That’s what I want.
And when I wanted something, I tended to go after it relentlessly.
I had another moment like that a few hours later, sitting on Ezra’s couch in the dark. Empty Chinese takeout containers littered the coffee table in front of us while Dirty Dancing played on the television screen. Ezra was curled up beside me, wrapped up in a blanket like a human burrito, mouthing all the kraken lead’s lines.
Every night could be like this, I thought, looking over at him, and I let myself imagine a world where I didn’t have to go back to my apartment above the shop. A world where we went right back upstairs, not just to fuck, but to fuck and fall asleep and to live. A world where he smiled more and worried less.
I want that, I thought.
The evening ended with us making out by the front door. I think Ezra wanted me to stay, but Monday was one of the busiest days at the shop, and he had an early appointment. Parting wasn’t easy, and we put it off for longer than we should have.
By the time I eventually made it back to my car, I had already decided I was going to marry him. It was a little soon to be jumping to proposals, but I knew. I just had to wait for him to catch up.
In the meantime, there were steps I needed to take, things I needed to do to build that world for us. It was going to be expensive, and I’d have to work my tail off, but Ezra was worth every penny.
I spent a few minutes making notes in the back of my recipe book, outlining my plan before I fell asleep.
The next day, I woke up and got right to work, cooking up a storm. Starting at four-thirty in the morning, I started whipping up doughnuts and muffins. When my assistant, Ben, came in at six, I had him put the trifold out on the sidewalk, advertising that we were selling breakfast for cheaper than the coffee place two doors down.
The shop was standing room only at eight, and a steady stream of customers came and went all morning. Ben manned the till while I baked my heart out in the back, switching from muffins and doughnuts over to bread. I made all the classics: French bread, garlic bread, rosemary and herbs, baguettes, yeast dinner rolls…
And then we changed the sign for the afternoon crowd, advertising we had ready-made pizza dough, take and bake rolls, and of course, fresh bread and pies.
By the time we closed the doors at five, I was exhausted. I’d kneaded so many loaves of bread that my biceps and shoulders ached, but there was one more special loaf of brioche to get out of the oven.
“Been a while since I’ve seen you bake like this, cuz,” Ben said, leaning in the doorway. He tipped his head, horns tapping against the door frame, tail swishing. “You lose a bet or something?”
I chuckled and tossed the dish towel over my shoulder. “Nah, nothing like that. I met someone.”
“Nothing worse than a bull in love,” Ben said with a snort. “Who’s the lucky idiot? Wait, let me guess.”
“You’ll never guess.” I pointed to the broom, indicating he should sweep while I finished up the dishes.
Ben rolled his eyes but grabbed the broom just the same. “Is it Phillipe from that mixer last year?”
“God, no. He was awful. Guess again.”
“That kraken Fedex guy you’re always flirting with?”
I laughed and shook my head. “Tentacles aren’t my speed, cuz. He’s a human.”
Ben stopped sweeping and looked at me like I had a third horn growing out of my head. “A human? Naw, quit messing with me.”
“I’m serious. Look.” I got out my phone and quickly pulled up the website for Enchanted Moments, which had a picture of Ezra on the main page. Ben came over and I held up the phone for him to see. “His name’s Ezra. He’s a wedding planner.”
He wrinkled his snout. “Eh, he looks high maintenance. How’s his dick game?”
“A-plus.” I gave Ben a shove. “Now get back to sweeping. I’d like to get out of here as soon as I get this brioche out of the oven. I’ve got places to be.”
“Oh, yeah? Seeing your boyfriend?”
“Nope, not tonight.” I opened the oven and checked the bread. Perfect. “Tonight, I’ve got dancing lessons.”
“Dancing lessons?” Ben said with a snort. “What kind of dancing?”
“Ballroom dancing.”
He paused and leaned on the broom. “Matteo, you do know you’re a minotaur, right?”
“Yep.”
“Just checkin’.” He shook his head and went back to sweeping.
I barely made it to the studio where I met with my instructor, Birdie Peretti. Birdie was a human, and a champion ballroom dancer with dozens of trophies. She was famous for her performances with her late husband, opera singer Ormand. I figured if anyone could teach me to dance with Ezra in five weeks, it’d be her.
I knocked on the door.
She pushed it open and squinted up at me through her horn-rimmed glasses. “Matteo Reyes?”
I shrugged. “That’s me.”
She wrinkled her nose. “You’re late,” she said and pushed open the door. “And don’t slouch.”
Three hours later, I fell face-down into my bed, ready to pass out then and there. I had less than eight hours before I had to get up and start all over again, and tomorrow was going to be even busier since I had to make the samples up for Inzo and Adam’s wedding cupcakes.
Birdie had pushed me hard, snapping like a drill sergeant. Who would’ve thought that ballroom dancing would be so damn hard? Of course, hooves didn’t make it any easier. I was so sore, I didn’t know how I was going to make it through another month of this.
My phone buzzed, and I groaned, turning over to retrieve it from where I’d tossed it. When I saw it was a text from Ezra, my exhaustion vanished. I sat up, suddenly awake and excited, heart pounding in my chest as I unlocked the phone to read the message.
Ezra: Miss you.
Two simple words and my heart melted like butter on an open flame.
Miss you, too, I typed back, and then added a second message. How was your day?
Ezra: Busy. Boring wedding planner stuff.
Matteo: I don’t care. I want to hear it.
Matteo: I’d listen to you explain paint dry.
Ezra: Technically, you’re reading, not listening. Unless you want me to call?
Matteo: Please? I’m desperate to hear your voice.
The phone rang a moment later, and I rushed to answer. “Hey, Sugar.”
“Can I tell you a secret? I love it when you call me that.”
My heart fluttered at the mere mention of the L-word, even though that wasn’t how I wanted to hear it. I grinned and fell back on the bed, phone to my ear. “Well, I can’t help it. I’m sweet on you.”
Ezra giggled, actually giggled like a schoolboy. God, that was never going to get old.
“Did you eat?” I asked, getting up and going into the kitchen where the brioche was waiting.
“I had a very nice caprese salad. You?”
“I work in a bakery, Sugar.”
He huffed. “Yes, but that doesn’t mean you eat. Even minotaurs can’t live on cookies and cakes, you know.”
“I’m making something now,” I said, getting out the eggs, vanilla, and milk. “Don’t you worry about me.”
He sighed.
I shifted the phone to my other ear, pulling down a mixing bowl. “What’s the matter, Sugar?”
