If there were tattoos on that gorgeous, taut ass, I’d trace them with my tongue. I’d lick and bite the plump skin there before spreading his cheeks to lick his hole.
My orgasm took me by surprise, hitting me as hard and fast as a gust of wind in a storm. My hips rocked up as I came, spunk coating my abs and the bits of my t-shirt that I hadn’t moved far enough up my chest. I kept stroking, drawing it out, and then lingered even longer, stroking the too-sensitive skin.
Fuck, when was the last time I’d come like that?
When I got up to retrieve a towel to clean up with, it wasn’t just my knees that felt weak and shaky. All of me did. That hadn’t just been a simple fantasy—it had felt… real. I hadn’t just wanted to fuck Javi. No, in my fantasy, we’d had the same kind of connection that we’d shared earlier.
“What am I doing?” I asked myself, throwing the towel and shirt in the laundry basket. My balls ached and my cock was still hard. Like I was twenty and in love, not just an old dad lusting after his hot neighbor.
As I crawled back into bed, I looked at the empty side.
Javi had proven himself a good friend tonight. He’d helped me when I’d needed it. Knowing that he’d been shaken up at work so badly and still managed to handle Giuliana like she was a treasure was beyond endearing and admirable, and I knew Javi couldn’t begin to imagine how much I appreciated it.
I could really use that kind of neighbor and friend, someone I could depend on. Which meant I had to stop screwing it up. Twice now I’d come on to him without thinking, and twice it had blown up in my face—not to mention all the times I’d inadvertently insulted him. If that wasn’t fate telling me something, I didn’t know what it was.
Javi deserved someone who had his shit together, which I most certainly did not.
10
Javi
“R-real t-talk,” I said to the director, “h-how much money d-do we need t-to raise?”
The relay race was the next day, and I’d been so caught up in the emotional roller coaster that was Gordo that I’d put the race on the backburner. Now it was here, and I was feeling overwhelmed and heavy with guilt for my absence in the lead-up.
“Real talk? Javi, I don’t know if the race will be enough. It isn’t just keeping up with rent and utilities. We don’t have enough volunteers, and we can’t afford to hire staff.”
The words were like lead, weighing me down. “What are you s-saying?”
Mike put a hand on my shoulder. “I’m saying I’m not sure I can get more help for kids like Andrew. Hell, help in general. We’ve been working at a deficit for so long and I kept hoping our luck would turn around, but it hasn’t. I can keep hoping, but if we’re lucky, hope and this race might buy us the rest of the year operating as we are already. No improvements, no new hires, and no promise we’ll still be open twelve months from now.”
It was a blow that sent shock waves through me. I was just a volunteer, but the center… it was like a second home for me. I’d lost so many homes, moved from place to place, that this shouldn’t have been such a blow. But I loved the center, and losing it would leave a hole I didn’t think I could recover from.
We ended our conversation on a low note, with Mike trying to keep positive and failing. As I drove to work after, I looked again at my knuckles. They spelled out half full—as in, the glass is always. I’d gotten it to remind myself that no matter how hard life kicked me (and it had kicked me pretty fucking hard), there was always some good. To remind myself that I could be good and not succumb to the nastiness of life like I had in my youth.
Half full. What did I have to offer, besides running in the race? Where did my talents lie? In childcare, but nobody wanted a young, tattooed Hispanic man taking care of their kid. Also, childcare couldn’t raise the kind of money the center needed. And the only other thing I was good at was tattooing.
Actually, that might just…
By the time I rolled into Get Ink’d, I had a plan. Too excited to talk, I signed