Page 21 of The Outcast (Breakfast at Bennett’s #4)

CHAPTER 21

ETHAN

The minute Ethan had Mickey inside, he was reaching for him. He’d thought about him all day. Every day. Ever since he brought him home, but especially since that kiss the other night and everything that came after it. Mickey’s eyes flashed with interest, and he slid his arms around Ethan’s waist.

“I don’t want you to think I only brought you over here for sex,” Ethan said, earning him a smile from Mickey.

“Would it be so bad?” Mickey pressed a chaste kiss against Ethan’s mouth. “I mean, jerking off is fine and all, but there’s a lot to be said about human contact. Especially with the subject of your jerk-off fantasies.” Mickey let go of Ethan and pulled his boots off. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and pulled out a row of condoms from one pocket and a bottle of lube from the other. With a smirk, he handed them to Ethan while he slipped out of his coat.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d been by a pharmacy yet, so I took the liberty of making sure we were well prepared.”

Ethan had done the super adult thing and ordered his supplies from the internet. Three cheers for two-day shipping and discreet packaging, saving Ethan from buying supplies out in the open where he felt exposed. Not that he was going to tell Mickey that.

“Do you want something to eat?”

Mickey shook his head and pushed Ethan’s jacket off his shoulders. “Later.”

Ethan stood still, watching the way Mickey focused on him as he finished helping Ethan out of his coat. Ethan toed out of his boots without taking his eyes off Mickey, who took the condoms and lube back from Ethan. He held them in one hand and Ethan looked down and watched Mickey lace their fingers together.

Mickey had great hands, Ethan decided. Slender, but soft, despite all that he’d been through. Gentle. Strong. Ethan had imagined those hands on him. In him. Ethan was stepping into his own bedroom before he really registered that Mickey was here and this was going to happen.

Mickey tossed the supplies on the bed and Ethan’s heart thrashed in his chest. Fear. Excitement. Embarrassment. A million fragmented emotions spun around inside him. Then Mickey was there with his hands on Ethan’s face. He pulled him down into a kiss and Ethan let him take the lead. Truthfully, he didn’t want the lead. All he wanted was to not disappoint Mickey.

Mickey’s tongue eased into Ethan’s mouth and Mickey let out one of his happy little sounds that went straight to Ethan’s dick. He hoped that tonight he’d be able to hold off longer than the four-point-six seconds it had taken him to blow his load last time.

The kiss came to a natural end and Mickey plucked at the hem of Ethan’s shirt, sliding it up his body, exposing his stomach. Fingers danced over bare skin and Mickey held Ethan’s gaze as he continued to lift his shirt. Ethan raised his arms and Mickey yanked the shirt off and tossed it aside.

Mickey looked at Ethan’s bare chest and he saw the way his lips twitched into a smile. He reached for Ethan, sweeping his hands over him, fingering his nipples, gently brushing his sides, making Ethan flinch as he huffed out soft laughter.

“That tickles.”

Mickey grinned at him, looking deliriously happy.

“I’ll remember that.” Mickey leaned in. His mouth was hot against Ethan’s skin. Soft lips left a trail of sensation along the trail Mickey kissed, starting at his neck and moving down and across his clavicle. Ethan shivered. Not because he was cold, but because he couldn’t remember wanting anything or anyone as badly as he wanted Mickey.

Mickey fumbled with Ethan’s pants, proving that he was just as nervous about this as Ethan was, which weirdly helped him feel more settled. It was a relief to know he wasn’t alone in his tangle of affection and lust.

“What do you want?” Mickey asked, skimming a finger along Ethan’s skin, just above the waist of his jeans.

“You. After that… doesn’t matter.”

Mickey smirked. “You’re smooth.”

“I’m nervous. I don’t want to embarrass myself again.”

“You didn’t embarrass yourself. I told you it was hot.” Mickey pressed himself up against Ethan, slotting their bodies together, and he wrapped his arms around Ethan’s neck. His lips ghosted over Ethan’s, making him chase Mickey’s mouth for a taste. “So hot,” Mickey said.

Ethan caught Mickey’s mouth and slipped his arms around him, deepening the kiss at the same time as he pulled him closer. Held him tighter. Skated his hands down Mickey’s back and cupped his ass as their tongues battled together, caressing and dancing in the midst of their mingled breath.

The way Mickey moved against his body felt like sin and suddenly Ethan needed more of it. He lifted Mickey’s shirt, breaking the kiss to pull it off and then Mickey was on him again, this time all hands and tongue and those soft, plump lips dragging down Ethan’s neck.

“Get undressed. Get on the bed. Don’t touch yourself," Mickey told him and Ethan scrambled to comply. He shoved his pants off, taking his underwear with them. He bent over and helped himself out of his socks as he pulled his feet free. Climbing onto the bed, he was keenly aware of Mickey’s gaze on him as he stretched out. His cock was hard and rested against his stomach when he rolled onto his back. A pool of precum soon appeared when he watched Mickey pop the button of his pants open.

Ethan’s fingers twitched with the urge to take himself in hand, and he must have started reaching for his cock because Mickey gave him a little shake of his head. Ethan put his hands down and gripped the bedding instead.

“Tell me, Ethan, what do you want?”

Ethan laughed and the nerves he thought he’d overcome swam back to the surface. “Just you. That’s all I have.” Ethan didn’t want to list all the ways he felt inadequate, he just wanted to enjoy this for as long as he could. Maybe one day Mickey would wake up and wonder what he was doing with a man twice his age, but until then, Ethan just wanted a little slice of happiness again. Something that was all his own. He loved his kids, but they couldn’t be the only things in his life worth loving. He needed something of his own.

“Just you,” Ethan repeated.

Mickey’s smirk was back and Ethan found he loved this version of him. The swagger. The cockiness. Ethan might not be young, or feel particularly young most of the time, but when Mickey looked at him like that—fire in his eyes as he kneeled on the bed and slowly crawled up until he was over top of him—he didn’t feel like any age at all. There wasn’t room for anything in his head that wasn’t Mickey.

“Just me.” Mickey ghosted a kiss against Ethan’s mouth. “Is there anything you’re not comfortable with?” Mickey slowly lowered himself down on Ethan, until their bodies were pressed together, hot and tight.

“I’ll let you know. I don’t know what I’m doing, Mickey. I just know I want you. Any way that you’re willing to take me.”

Mickey’s eyes sparkled. “I’ll take good care of you. I should tell you that I got tested recently. I’m negative. I should have said something earlier.”

Ethan had driven to a clinic at the next town over to get tested again. Even though he hadn’t really had a need to, seeing as his recent sexual history was non-existent. But it was important to him to be on the same page as Mickey. To show him that he cared about his safety.

“Now’s just as good as any time. I got tested too. I know I’m not out yet, and that I have to tell the kids soon, but I wanted something to show you that I was serious about giving this a shot.”

Mickey crashed his mouth down on Ethan’s and kissed him hard. Teeth clacked together, but Ethan didn’t care. He sank his hand into Mickey’s hair and gripped the silky strands. He’d need another haircut soon and maybe he’d let Ethan do it again.

It hadn’t been a burden at all to take care of Mickey. It had been a pleasure. It filled little cracks in Ethan that he didn’t know existed until Mickey came along, needing things Ethan liked to believe only he could give him. Things like safety and warmth, a place by the fire, and a guitar lesson. Things that didn’t cost Ethan anything, but were precious to Mickey. He’d seen the awe and the gratitude in the way Mickey looked at him sometimes. Even before they kissed, it was there in every whispered thank you and every tentative smile.

Mickey’s smile wasn’t tentative now. Looking down at Ethan, he skimmed a fingertip down Ethan’s cheek. “You want to give this a shot, but I don’t even know what this is.”

“This is us. You and me. I haven’t—” Ethan cleared his throat of a sudden emotional storm. “I haven’t been happy in a long time, Mickey. Not like this.”

Mickey’s lips trembled against Ethan’s and there was no more talking after that. It was all hands and breaths and for a while they just made out. Naked and pressing against each other, arching and squirming and reaching for more, only to back off when things got too heated. Soon enough, Ethan couldn’t even think straight he was so hard.

Mickey trailed his hand down Ethan’s chest, skimming over his nipple. Ethan sucked in a breath. God, was he sensitive everywhere or was it just Mickey?

“I can make you happier. If you’ll let me.” Mickey’s hand snaked lower. “Will you let me?” Mickey punctuated the question with a kiss pressed to Ethan’s shoulder.

The answer was hell yes . Fuck yes. Immediately and eternally yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But instead of any of that, Ethan managed a nod and a strangled, “Yeah,” that rasped out of him because he’d lost his mind to Mickey.

Mickey kissed his way down Ethan’s torso, flicking his tongue over each nipple. Laving them, sucking. Ethan nearly came when Mickey scraped his teeth over one.

“Too much?” Ethan heard the smile in Mickey’s voice when he asked.

“A little, yeah. But don’t stop.”

Mickey dragged his blunt fingertips down Ethan’s chest, over his nipples, then dipping his hand lower and sliding down the outside of Ethan’s leg. Which was not where Ethan wanted to feel Mickey’s touch just now.

Mickey, the fiend, knew it too, because he buried a laugh against Ethan’s skin.

“Patience,” he chided.

Whatever Ethan was going to say was lost as Mickey, lithe and sleek, slid down Ethan’s body, leaving a trail of open-mouthed kisses on his skin. All the way down his chest, following the treasure trail as Mickey urged Ethan to part his legs and make room between them.

Mickey fit himself into the newly created space. A whisper of a breath ghosted against Ethan’s skin, the delicate place where his leg met his groin and then a hot, wet kiss landed there.

The sound that came out of Ethan wasn’t human. Mickey made him feel unhinged in the best possible way. Untethered and free of anything that wasn’t here in this room, on this bed, on his skin.

Ethan gripped the bedding with one hand and squeezed, and Mickey looked up at him. A hand skimmed up, up, up his stomach and Mickey grazed his nipple while shooting Ethan an almost predatory smile.

And then Mickey’s pretty pink tongue slid out of his mouth and Ethan watched enraptured as he licked a trail up the underside of Ethan’s cock.

“The things I want to do to you, Ethan.” Mickey spoke with such confidence. Such reverence. Ethan’s head swam.

“Do them. Whatever you want. I bet they’re no different from the things I want you to do to me.”

“What things are those?” Mickey lightly dragged his hand back down Ethan’s body. He trembled under Mickey’s suddenly intense scrutiny.

“Everything.”

“Be more specific.”

Ethan couldn’t fathom how he managed to say the words when he wasn’t sure when he’d stopped breathing. “I want you inside me.”

Mickey’s tongue darted out and he licked a bead of precum off the tip of Ethan’s cock. “Was that so hard?”

“Yes, actually.” Ethan laughed, and then Mickey was laughing too. He scrambled up the bed and crushed his lips against Ethan’s.

“You’re not supposed to be a smart ass,” Mickey told him as he grabbed the lube and a condom and stole another kiss.

Ethan wasn’t a total bottom virgin. He was familiar with his own fingers and his own toys, but so far no one else had been inside him that way. He’d had opportunities before, but nothing had felt right. Until now.

But he couldn’t find the breath to put that into words just yet. Those feelings were still big and new and Ethan didn’t know what to do with them. So he pushed them aside and let everything else fall away until there was only him, and Mickey, and the way his breath felt ghosting over Ethan’s skin.