man who’s experienced. That’s really hot.”
Noah snorted. “You think everything about me is hot.”
“Truer words have never been spoken,” Alex conceded and let his eyes travel over Noah’s splayed-out form, not even trying to hide the heated look in his eyes and not caring about the fact that they were surrounded by people. But that was Alex for you, straightforward and unapologetic in everything he did, and Noah loved every cocky, crazy, perfect inch of him.
The pinch of the needle when it pierced his skin was familiar. You didn’t go a decade giving blood every few months without getting used to the process. It had been strange at first. When the first year without donating had passed, Noah had had a crisis, especially because it coincided with a national incident where there were a lot of victims. Noah had felt out of it for weeks, anxious and guilty at the thought of there possibly being people hurt who could have used his blood donations.
It had taken a couple of long-overdue therapy sessions to deal with the guilt and some serious late-night conversations with Alex where Noah could talk through his feelings.
All of that had only made Alex work harder in his quest to stop the discrimination in regard to LGBTQ blood donation. He had teamed up with a number of organizations and people, all of them working tirelessly day after day. Seeing how Alex fought to guarantee Noah’s and everybody else’s right for equal treatment made Noah love Alex even more, and that had been a challenge because Noah’s heart had already been so filled with love that he didn’t think it was possible to add another drop. He’d been wrong. With each day that passed, his love for Alex grew stronger and deeper.
“I guess this is not the time to tell you that I’m kind of iffy about needles?” Alex said as the nurse finished wiping Alex’s arm. “Is it supposed to be this big?” he asked, glaring at the needle.
“That’s what he said,” Noah muttered under his breath, which made Alex lean forward and stare at him. “Really? You choose now to bring out the sex jokes?”
“What can I say? I have impeccable timing.”
“I mean, impeccable taste in boyfriends maybe, but your timing kind of sucks. I thought you were supposed to support me?”
“I thought you enjoyed the way I sucked,” Noah said innocently.
Alex slowly lifted one of his legs over the other. Noah smirked. He had no doubt Alex was remembering that same morning when Noah had joined him in the shower and had ended up on his knees in front of Alex. He’d definitely sucked then, and Alex had definitely enjoyed it.
“I don’t hear any support,” Alex complained.
“Well, you have a needle in your vein, and you didn’t even notice the moment it was inserted, so I’d say I did an adequate job at helping you through your first time,” Noah said and settled back in his chair.
Alex looked down at his arm. “Huh. How’d it get there?”
“You always want to choose an experienced partner for your first time,” the nurse deadpanned. “You got lucky.”
Alex widened his eyes at Noah. “You do realize that you’ve managed to get a medical professional to start making sex jokes? I’m impressed.”
Noah laughed until the nurse barked at him to stop jostling the needle.
“Is it weird that I kind of missed this?” Noah asked, examining the bandage on the inside of his elbow.
“Yes,” Alex replied without hesitation and laughed as Noah dug his fingers into Alex’s rib cage. Alex, apparently, was really not a fan of needles. But knowing his boyfriend, Noah was sure Alex would be sitting in that donor chair, right next Noah for years and years to come.
“Hey! Driving here,” Alex protested as he squirmed away from Noah’s fingers.
“I can see. Why is that? You lured me into this car with the promise of breakfast, and now we’ve been driving for an hour and are in the middle of nowhere. Are you planning to impress me and hunt and gather the food?” Noah asked.
“That was my master plan. I’ll seductively pick berries until you can’t resist me, and then we all know what inevitably follows—forest sex.”
Noah laughed. “First of all, I can’t wait to see that sexy berry-picking action. But there’s a fatal flaw in your plan.”
“Impossible.”
“Oh but there is. See, I already can’t resist you, so you’ve just wasted a whole lot of time on driving us to the middle of nowhere when we could have