Page 355

“Okay, if you fuck me, is it going to hurt?”

Just when he thought he might be able to deal with whatever came out of Matt’s mouth, Nick found him knocked on his ass again. His mouth went dry and there was no hiding the tent in his pants. Matt’s eyes drifted down to his crotch, gaze flashing with interest and amusement.

“Doesn’t have to,” Nick finally managed. “If you know what you’re doing.”

Matt rolled his eyes to the ceiling, holding them there thoughtfully. “And I’m sure you know what you’re doing.”

Nick cleared his throat. “I know...enough.”

Matt walked out and came back into the room with a kitchen chair. “I’d ask if it should be the other way around, but I know you’re a top, so I figure I should ask.”

“How do you even know that word?” Nick sputtered.

Matt snorted, standing on the chair to hang the lights above the door frame. “Oh, please. It’s not exactly a super-secret code that the dirty heterosexuals can never learn.”

“You’re not sounding very heterosexual at the moment,” Nick pointed out.

“No, but I am being pretty dirty.”

“That you are.”

“Plus, I’m standing here, noticing your hard-on, talking about fulfilling every suspicion everyone ever had about us. I guess I don’t sound very heterosexual,” Matt said with all the air of a man who couldn’t care less what he was saying.

And as much as Nick was fixated on the sheer vivid imagery floating through his head, most of which involved Matt naked and panting beneath him, that last statement brought his mind to a grinding halt.

With what Matt had said before, he realized everything had inferred that Matt wasn’t simply toying with the idea. Matt was dead set on experiencing the whole gamut of everything that would come with being with Nick.

He was planning onbeing with him.

“Oh,” Nick said.

“Did your brain break back there?” Matt asked over his shoulder as he struggled to get the last lights up.

Nick watched him, smiling gently. Maybe things weren’t as simple as Matt was making them out to be, but maybe they were. If Matt was willing to tip himself over the edge and see what came of it, then Nick would have no choice but to follow. As had already been said, it was the two of them, always had been, always would be. Nick would follow Matt, and if that meant as a couple, then he would go gladly.

“No, just having a moment,” Nick said, pushing himself upright.

“Well, have your moment and come help me. I want to have these decorations up before we’re expected for dinner,” Matt grunted.

“Dinner?” Nick asked, blinking.

“Yeah, bud, it’s Christmas Eve. If you think we’re going to get out of dinner because I’m having a crash course in being with a dude, you obviously don’t know the woman who raised you.”

“My mother would skin us both if we tried,” Nick admitted.

“Exactly, so let’s get this place Christmas’d up, shower, and get ready for the party.”

Nick stepped forward, reaching out as Matt stepped back from the wall. With the other man on the chair, he could wrap his arms around Matt’s legs and place his head against his stomach. Matt’s fingers curled in his hair, pulling affectionately.

“We’ve got this,” Matt said softly.

And Nick believed him.

MATT

The decorating went smoothly. With the two of them and not too many decorations, it hadn’t taken long. They had a slight delay when it came time to clean up, in the form of a mostly naked Nick dragging Matt into the bathroom to share a shower.

It wasn’t the first time they’d shared a shower, but none of the previous times had been quite like that. Matt found himself distracted by Nick’s naked, wet body. In the back of his head, he’d always appreciated Nick as an example of the male gender. His broad chest and thick limbs, covered in a fine layer of blond hair, were things he’d always appreciated aesthetically.