Somewhere to Belong Read online

  “No, they aren’t. If you let people treat you like all you’re good for is sex, people generally will. It’s rare that anyone will give you any kind of push back against that.”

  “You didn’t, not at first anyway.”

  He didn’t sound angry about that at all. He was simply stating a fact like it was currently dark outside, which it was. But I didn’t like that about myself at all. And I hated that he’d realized that and pointed it out. I didn’t mean to be like that with him, and I would have loved to have known his name before I did, but I hadn’t insisted on it. Maybe I should have. But he’d been so secretive whenever I’d asked him any questions about himself that I was afraid I would have lost him completely. “I’m sorry. I should have tried harder to get answers out of you from the beginning. I always wanted to know about you. Ever since the start.”

  He blushed a little. “I wouldn’t have answered you. I still don’t want you knowing things, so don’t think this is going to be some big turning point. I’m just feeling a bit more relaxed right now. Probably since you’ve seen me at my job, and now you know me with my clothes on.” He shrugged, and I decided to move on to what I really wanted to know.

  “Do you like being hurt?” I quietly asked him.

  He’d been playing with his collar again, off and on, but stopped as soon as I finished asking my question. “Not anything more than what you do for me when we’re together. Pinching my nipples or something like that. It works for me.”

  “But trying to strangle you doesn’t?” I needed that clarified. If there was something I could try to give him to satisfy that need of his, then…. No. I couldn’t even begin to imagine putting my hands around his throat, much less enjoying it.

  “No. It doesn’t. Can we talk about something else?”

  His tone told me he would rather talk about anything but the bruises around his throat. But I wasn’t done with that line of questioning yet. “When I’m done finding out what you’re doing in such a dangerous situation.” He started to get up, but I grabbed his hand. I wasn’t going to trap him there and force him to tell me, but I didn’t want him to run away from me either just because I wanted to know that he was safe. “Please stay.”

  “I won’t tell you what’s going on.”

  I expected that. I’d pushed him too far, too fast. I wanted to know what was going on with him, but I wasn’t going to risk losing him either. “Stay. I won’t ask you about what you’re going through again or why you’d put up with someone hurting you like you are.”

  Eli sighed and went back to sitting down next to me. I thought that would be the end of it, but then he spoke again. “I’m trading sex with him for something I need. That’s all it is.”

  “Drugs?” I immediately guessed. But Eli just rolled his eyes. “Then what?”

  “Do you want in my ass tonight?” he asked me bluntly, and I knew where he was going with that question. I needed to not ask him any more questions if I wanted him to stay with me longer than the next five minutes.

  “I want you to stay,” I replied. I didn’t absolutely need to have him in my bed that night, but I wouldn’t have turned him down either. Instead I wanted his company, and to get that from him, I was willing to stop asking him so many questions he clearly wasn’t interested in and were possibly making him uncomfortable too.

  He smiled at me and started stripping off his shirt. “Then let’s go. Where do you want me?”

  He was always so beautiful to me. His pale skin, his lack of hair, his bright pink nipples, his subtle muscles that I now knew were likely from years of working with horses. At one time I’d thought he’d been a dancer. Something classical like ballet and in a company in Denver. There’d been a time, months ago, that I’d had dreams of going to see him perform, bringing him a bouquet of luscious red roses at the end of his performance, and having him kiss me in front of the whole audience.

  But with his shirt off, I couldn’t stop staring at his neck. Until he sighed. “Figure it out, Grayson. Either you want me, despite my neck, or you’re going to stare at those marks the whole time we’re together, which, in that case, won’t be very long. They don’t bother me. I’m over it. But I need you to snap out of it if you expect me to stay here right now.”

  He was right. So I tried not to think about someone putting their hands around his neck and squeezing his skin hard enough to make him bruise. And I forced myself not to picture Eli lying there, taking that kind of torture, in trade for whatever he thought he needed. It was too much and even as I tried to stand up and take him back to my bedroom, where I would have laid him down and been inside of him, much like I was picturing someone else doing while they tried to strangle him, I couldn’t.

  I shook my head and sat back down on the couch. “Maybe you should just go.” I took a long drink of my wine and wished I could change things for him, whatever his circumstances were.

  He hesitated. “Because the bruises bother you that much? I can keep my shirt on if you want. If it’ll help.”

  I thought Eli was sweet to offer the compromise, since I knew how much he hated wearing anything while he was having sex. But the bruises weren’t what I had a direct issue with.

  “They aren’t the problem,” I said as I leaned back and looked up at him while he stood there above me. “I keep imagining someone doing that to you, and I can’t help feeling disgusted by the whole human race at the idea of someone wanting to hurt you for what I can only assume was their own sick amusement. I can’t help but picture you lying under someone while they have their hands around your throat, and for whatever reason, you allow it to happen.”

  He came over and knelt on the couch beside me. I took his hand when he offered it to me. “I won’t come over when I have bruises again.”

  “I’d rather that you not be in a position where you’re being bruised. You’ve had marks on your body this time and last time. If this continues and you decide not to subject me to your bruised body, I may never see you again.”

  Eli looked away from me, and I realized he had no idea when this situation, whatever it was, would stop. Did he owe this person for the next month? Or was he trapped in whatever he was doing for a year or more?

  “Will you please tell me what’s going on? Maybe I could help you.” I was practically pleading with him, and I wasn’t above begging him.

  Eli shook his head, and he wouldn’t look back up at me. Instead he slid from the couch to the floor and began undoing my pants. I put my hands over his, but he was insistent.

  “Please?” He’d already taken my soft cock out.

  I lay back and closed my eyes, giving him permission. If he didn’t want to talk about it, I wouldn’t be able to make him. But maybe he’d let me give him pleasure. I doubted that he got that with whoever he was with who liked to hurt him, and I knew from the app that he hadn’t been active on there recently, except to talk to me.

  “Back on the couch, pants off,” I told him softly. The words might have been a command, but I made sure my tone didn’t imply that. While he was getting comfortable, I got undressed as well. I knew he liked giving head, so I didn’t fight him on that at all. But I didn’t force him down or become rough with him either. There were times that I had. I’d even fucked his mouth while he was leaning back against a wall and I’d stood over him before. That had been rough and beautiful, and we’d both been panting and sated afterward. But tonight I didn’t want to be rough with him at all. I simply wanted to touch him and enjoy him as we gave each other pleasure. So I ran my hand through his soft hair, being careful that I didn’t tug on the strands at all. With my other hand, I stroked down his back until I ran my fingers into the slit of his ass.

  He had his plug in, like he always did. I’d never met someone who was comfortable wearing one for as long as Eli did. It was as if the toy had become just another piece of clothing to him. He hadn’t removed it for me this time, as if he knew I didn’t intend to be inside of him that night. I pushed on his plug, and he pressed himself into
the cushions of my black leather couch while also putting his mouth back over me. I was getting harder now at the sight of his perfectly round ass, even before I felt the slickness of his tongue against my head. He had a wonderful mouth, but it was the soft sounds that he made while he was giving me pleasure that really worked in my favor. He sucked me like he enjoyed it too, and not like it was a chore for him to go through before he could get to something better, or before he was done with me. I’d been with enough men in my lifetime to know the difference between someone who was simply going through the motions when it came to sucking someone off and someone like Eli who seemed to genuinely enjoy the experience.

  As he gave my cock his attention, I played with the plug, pushing on it and moving it until he was squirming under my hand and practically humping my couch. It wouldn’t take much longer now. I’d been with him enough times to know the signs of when he was close to finding his own pleasure. I got up on my knees to both give him better access to me and also so that I could stroke my hands down his spine as he slid himself against my couch. I loved watching him come, and listening to him was like being at the symphony as each of his soft cries built on the other until it was all a beautiful melody of pleasure and abandon.

  He pulled his mouth off of me, and I leaned back so I could see his face. “Is something wrong?”

  “I’m close.” His cheeks were dark red, and his eyes were full of lust and pleasure. Even if I didn’t know his cries, I would have been able to tell that he was close just from looking at his face.

  “I know. Go ahead.”

  He hesitated. “I’ll make your couch dirty.”

  “It’s leather. It wipes off easily,” I said with a laugh. He smiled and took me back into his mouth, and I placed my palm flat against his plug as I toyed with it inside of him. He arched back on occasion, letting me know he’d liked what I was doing to him. I wanted something that I could stroke into him, but that would have to wait for another time since I didn’t own any toys of my own. I imaged that he did, though. Someone who walked around with a plug in his ass all day surely had a collection of toys he could use to fuck himself with when the need arose.

  It didn’t take long before his humping of my couch became erratic and his cries became hoarser as he got even closer. I knew what would push him over the edge. A bit of pain always worked for him. But in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to scratch my fingers over his ass like I’d done before to get him to climax. I pulled on his hair, giving him a light tug and not nearly what I normally would have done, but it seemed to be enough for him, as he moaned around my cock and afterward lay still.

  He hadn’t stopped using his mouth, though, and his pleasure had brought me close enough to mine that I had to pull back before I came in his mouth. Despite how good he felt in that moment, I was sure he wouldn’t have appreciated that slip up from me. So I pulled myself out of his mouth, despite his quiet protests. He turned over as if knowing what was going on, despite his postsex haze, and I stroked myself until I shot long lines of come over his chest and stomach.

  Before he could protest, as he always did when I told him he could shower in whatever hotel room I’d booked for us, I had my hand around his wrist and I had brought him to his feet. He resisted, lightly, by dragging his feet, but I wasn’t having any of it as I took him to the downstairs bathroom and helped him under the spray of the hot shower. I kept both bathrooms well stocked with my favorite soaps and shampoos, and getting him clean could have been an easy job of simply washing him off like an old gardening bucket.

  But once I had him under the spray of the shower, I wanted to linger there with him. He leaned back against the tile and let me wash him. I took my time soaping him up and cupping the water over his skin. He closed his eyes and let me do what I wanted to him. He didn’t even lift his arm to protest against me once. And that, by far, was the saddest part of it all, because I could see so easily how someone would take advantage of him in this or any situation. I knew, as well, that I was to blame for this too. Whenever we’d gotten together, he’d been able to come, and I’d always made sure it was first and that I’d never hurt him. I’d made sure that he was okay when he left. But I’d never asked him to meet me just to be able to lavish pleasure on him with no regard for myself. We’d been hooking up for months and maybe that wasn’t to be expected of two people in our situation, but it hadn’t been so long since I’d dated someone else that I didn’t remember what it was like to give pleasure without any expectation of my own being met.

  I turned off the water and held Eli close. Getting him dry was no harder for me than it had been to wash him. He was silent and pliant in my hands, even as I finished taking care of him and brought him back to the living room. There he dressed himself as I silently watched.

  “Will you stay here tonight?” I hoped he would, even though I knew what his answer was likely going to be.

  Eli shook his head, as I expected, and he finished getting his shoes on. “I have an early day tomorrow.”

  “If something happens and you need a place to be, you’re welcome to come here,” I told him.

  He gave me a long look, then shook his head again. “I have my own apartment.”

  I was sure that he did, even though we’d never talked about it. He seemed too independent, too unwilling to accept even the slightest bit of help from me, that I couldn’t see him living with someone where he’d have to rely on them all the time.

  “Will you tell me what’s going on with you?”

  “No.” Eli’s snappish tone told me that there would be no discussion on that point. I relented and nodded, conceding to him.

  “When you leave here, are you safe?” I pressed him.

  Eli sighed and ran his hands through his hair. He messed up the strands, but instead of making his hair look unruly, he only looked like he’d been having fun. Not necessarily like he’d just come, but he had a satisfied look about him. Except when I looked at his eyes. Only then could I really see just how upset he was.

  “I’ll stop,” I said, hating the way he smiled at that, like he was relieved by me giving up.

  “No, you won’t. But that’s because you care for some reason. See you later.” He let himself out of my house, and still naked, I pulled the sheer front curtains aside to be able to watch him get into his car, which was at least ten years old and looked completely shabby next to my luxury model. But Eli didn’t even give my car a second glance. He’d never known that the car was mine before, since I’d always parked near other cars at any of the hotels we’d been at together, but now that he had to know, he acted like he couldn’t have cared less. It was a curious thing. I expected him to react somehow to our obvious difference in wealth. But he just looked up at me and gave me a weary smile as he backed out of my driveway.

  Chapter Seven

  Eli

  WHEN I got home, I wanted to strip off all my clothes, dump them somewhere in the vicinity of my horribly overflowing laundry basket, and go right to bed. Thanks to Grayson, I didn’t need to shower, but I definitely wasn’t ready to do anything else that day. And I sure as hell wasn’t in the mood. So, when I’d barely been able to get my shirt off and someone came knocking at my door, I had to resist the urge to yell at them. I had to really bite my tongue when I saw Brent on the other side of my door.

  “You’re supposed to text first,” I grumbled at him. “You can’t just come over and expect me to put out.”

  Brent laughed at me and pushed his way into my apartment. Over a month of dealing with him, and I was too tired to fight back, or even argue, at this point. “Yes, I can. And we both know it.”

  I hoped that I could just get this over with as quickly as possible so that I could take another shower and go back to my day. “Fine. Whatever. What do you want?”

  He stepped forward and cupped me through my jeans. I didn’t react, and I wasn’t ever hard with him. He got bored quickly and went to something he knew would get a reaction from me—yanking on my hair. I cringed, but
I didn’t cry out this time. I hadn’t in weeks.

  “You’re boring me, Eli.”

  “Sorry.” I wasn’t. “What do you want?” I hated having to repeat myself to him. If someone at the rescue didn’t understand something right away, I had no problem talking to them for hours about something that had to do with horses, especially when it came to their safety. But Brent could go fuck off for all I cared.

  “You, ass up.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Fine.”

  “But first I want to see how well you can take a hit.” I’d barely heard him, and didn’t even have time to register what he was saying, before he punched me in my cheek. I went down, holding my cheek.

  At least the rest of the night went quickly.

  THE NEXT morning at work, everyone was staring at me. And I didn’t blame them one bit. I had a swollen cheek, a split lip, and a black eye. All of my face hurt, and that wasn’t even the start of it. Wearing a turtleneck helped, some, but it didn’t help with the pain I was in. I’d gone to the clinic after Brent had left, and made up some lie about being mugged. I was relatively sure the police officers there hadn’t bought my story, but they hadn’t exactly pressed me for more answers either. It was a good thing I wouldn’t be seeing Grayson that evening, because he wouldn’t have settled for the half-assed answers I’d been able to come up with the night before.

  One of my only friends, Mason, came out of the barn and ran when he saw me pull up to the sanctuary. “Holy shit.” He hugged me, and I forced myself not to wince too badly. He was twenty-one and absolutely adorable with sun-bleached blond hair. He’d never had a boyfriend and, as far as I knew, was still a virgin. He was so innocent and fragile, and I was sure he didn’t even have a place to start from in understanding what I was doing or what I was willingly putting myself through with Brent. So I kept my mouth shut when I could have told him everything.