“That was part of the breakdown, huh?”
“I tried rebelling like a normal teenager for a while. Parties. Staying out past curfew. Little rebellions like that.” He gave Sullivan a sheepish look. “It didn’t last long. I wasn’t very good at it, and it only made me feel worse. My parents didn’t understand. Of all my siblings, I was adopted the youngest, and I haven’t had a lot of the same problems, so I could tell they didn’t know where it was coming from. I didn’t know how to say that the idea of graduating from high school was making me wish I could hibernate until it was all over.”
“You thought hurting yourself was preferable to telling them the truth about how you felt?” Sullivan was mostly watching the nonprofit building, but he was glancing over frequently, his brow furrowed. The fact that he cared helped counter the anxiety of the subject matter.
“I didn’t want them to hate me.”
As soon as he said it, he felt stupid. Of course they wouldn’t hate him; they loved him. Even as angry as he was with them now, he knew that. But feelings didn’t always reflect reality, and they didn’t have to make sense. He had to train himself out of that kind of thinking. Train himself into thinking of his needs and opinions as equally valid, as well as being the ones that he weighted the most when it came to decisions like this.
“That wouldn’t happen,” Tobias said, when it looked like Sullivan was about to ask how likely it was. “But he’ll be hurt when I tell him I’m not going to be a doctor anymore.”
Later, while Tobias read in the living room, Sullivan got caught up on his subpoenas, cursing under his breath the whole time. He also called his sisters—all five of them in a row, and spent nearly three hours altogether in his bedroom in conversation with them about various jobs, men, children, sports, and parents-in-law. Tobias and Sullivan made dinner together afterward, talking about a million small things, none of which were related to the case.
It was oddly, satisfyingly domestic.
That night, tired and pressed for time, Sullivan slid on top of Tobias and pushed his thighs apart with his knees. Sullivan kissed him deeply, rocking their dicks together in a slow-building, shuddering rhythm until Tobias couldn’t breathe through the heat. “You love that I make you feel like this, don’t you?” Sullivan asked, his voice low and smug.
Tobias nodded helplessly.
“Yeah, I thought so. For a good boy, you’re awfully needy. I’m going to have to give you a lot of cock to keep you satisfied, won’t I, Tobias?” Sullivan was looking at him with dark, expectant eyes, and he knew exactly what Sullivan wanted to hear.
“Yes,” Tobias whispered. His face couldn’t be more painfully red. Perhaps tomorrow he would be horrified by the things they were saying, but right now it was a fire in his blood.
“Do you know why?”
An answer crept to the tip of his tongue, but Tobias couldn’t say it. Could he? Sullivan was still watching him, probably expecting something along the lines of because I’m a bad boy, but somehow the real words came out, tiny but daring, “Because I’m a slut.”
Sullivan’s breath caught and his eyes widened. “Oh, that’s good, sweetheart.” Sullivan leaned down, nosed at Tobias’s jaw, pressing a kiss there in reward. “God, you’re so good for me.”
The praise sank into Tobias deeply, made him shudder with warm, sweet pleasure. It was almost enough to override the heat that came from Sullivan’s continued words. Almost.
“Maybe I’ll make you beg for it,” Sullivan murmured thoughtfully. “Make you beg to get fucked. Make you beg to suck me. I can do anything I want and you’ll like it. Because you’re a slut, aren’t you?”
“Please.” Tobias had felt filthy and overwhelmed when he said that forbidden little word—slut—but it was so much hotter when Sullivan said it. He was so close. He lifted his hips, trying to get more friction. “Please let me come.”
“Not yet. Not until you admit you want it.”
He couldn’t think, his mind hazy and blank, but he obeyed instinctively. He gasped, “I want it.”
“That’s my good boy. Go ahead and come, sweetheart.”
“I want it,” Tobias repeated, just for himself, and came in a long rush against Sullivan’s belly.
“I know,” Sullivan replied, and he came too, his mouth hot and demanding against Tobias’s the whole time.
Are you allowed to kiss people like you might be dying during casual sex? Tobias typed out in a message to Church while Sullivan was in the bathroom getting a washcloth for cleanup.
He didn’t send it.
* * *
On Friday, after they followed Cindy home from early dinner with her girlfriends, they parked down the street and waited. Eight-thirty was too early to assume she was in for the night.
“It’s been a week.” Tobias rolled his window up, grimacing and slapping at the gnats and no-see-ums. Sullivan didn’t blame him; the tiny annoyances were legion after dark. “At what point do we go ask Cindy about the guy who took her car?”
“At the point when otherwise we have to abandon the case.”
“And we’re not there yet?”
“You said it yourself—it’s been a week. Do you see everyone in your whole life every week? Patience is a virtue.”
“I’m patient.” He fidgeted in his seat for a second. “Okay, but what about K in Ghost’s phone? We have to call at some point, right?”
“Nope. The logic there hasn’t changed. We don’t want anyone to know we’re looking.” Sullivan flicked him on the leg. “Chill. It’ll happen sooner or later.”
When a trace of
