Beginnings and Ends (Short Story) Read Free Page A

feeling.” He sighed. “I don’t really know what I want to do. I mean, I know that I want you to kiss me, but I always want you to—”
    Jules kissed him. Long and hard and hot, his tongue in Robin’s mouth, his arms wrapped around him as he pushed this man whom he loved more than life itself clear out of the closet, until Robin’s back hit the bedroom wall.
    And there they were, both breathing hard, chest against chest, hips against hips, as Jules stared up into Robin’s beautiful eyes.
    “Does this help? Exorcise some demons?” Jules murmured, even though he already knew the answer. He didn’t wait for Robin to respond. He just kissed him again.
    Robin’s reply was to shuck off his jacket and reach between them to unfasten Jules’s pants even as he kissed him back.
    He couldn’t taste any alcohol—of course the incident had happened hours ago. Still, all Jules could taste was Robin—his desire curiously mixed with his anxiety and fear.
    And he knew in that instant that, as diverting as some rough-and-tumble sex was going to be, there were some things that Robin had to hear first.
    So he stopped kissing him and put his own hand on top of Robin’s. He couldn’t quite bring himself to grab Robin’s wrist and pull his hand away—he loved Robin’s touch too much for that. But he did manage to make Robin stop stroking him as he said, “This is going to be okay. You know that, right? That whatever happens, I’m going to be right here, beside you. Always.”
    Robin nodded because he knew that, but the emotion and vulnerability in his face took Jules’s breath away.
    “Whatever you want to do,” Jules continued quietly, “we’ll do it. You want to go talk to Dr. Everly, at the rehab center? We can do that. You want to be monitored, to make sure the alcohol that
did
get in your system isn’t somehow messing you up, we’ll do that, too. You want me to stay with you around the clock for the next few days, so that there’s absolutely no chance of you somehow, I don’tknow, slipping … I’ll be right here, although I honestly don’t think you need that. You’re one of the strongest men I know.”
    Robin smiled at that. “Somewhere a few dozen Navy SEALs are bristling with indignation.”
    Jules smiled back at him. “Not the ones who know you,” he countered. “The ones who know you would agree with me.”
    “How did I get so fucking lucky?” Robin whispered, and despite Jules’s hand still covering his own, he resumed his motion. But more gently this time—a slow slide down Jules’s entire length and back, Robin’s fingers warm against him, tight but not too tight. Touching Jules exactly the way he liked to be touched.
    Robin leaned down to kiss Jules sweetly, almost reverently, on the mouth, and Jules laughed because he knew Robin well enough to know exactly what that look in his eyes meant, exactly where this was heading. “I thought we were exorcising demons,” he said as, sure enough, Robin released him, but only to turn them both so that it was now Jules whose back was against the wall.
    “Didn’t you just promise you’d do whatever I want?” Robin’s smile was beautiful as he sank down to his knees, dragging Jules’s jeans and his shorts down his thighs as he kissed him and caressed him and God, Jules was glad he had the wall to help hold him up. He sank his fingers into the softness of Robin’s hair as he closed his eyes and fought his body’s need for an immediate release.
    And even though Robin had called himself
lucky
, it was Jules who was just that, because he knew, without a doubt, that his husband honestly loved what he was doing, even though it seemed lopsided in terms of give and take. Jules knewthat if Robin had his way, he would greet Jules exactly like this, every time they spent more than an hour apart.
    For the first few months of their relationship, Jules had pointed out that it was entirely possible for him to use his mouth, too, in equally creative ways. And