room for the two lovers, expecting to see their plump, pale curves spread across the bed in joyous abandon.
“That was personal,” Tucker said, half laughing. Angel locked eyes with him desperately, hoping to be grounded.
He was sorely disappointed.
Tucker’s cheeks were unevenly pink, his skin blotchy with arousal, and his eyes were fever bright. Angel’s gaze raked the flushed skin of his throat and chest, then down his rippled stomach to his….
Angel heard a faint moan, and realized he’d made it.
Tucker looked at the swell in his cargo shorts, lying fat and unapologetic along the side. “Uh, yeah,” he said, grinning cockily through what looked to be a combination of embarrassment and desire. “That was pretty damned hot.”
“It was private,” Angel squeaked. “I didn’t know—”
Tucker shuddered and adjusted himself, hips undulating in excitement. “Well, now we do!” He looked around the room and sighed. “You know what? I’ll get back to this place tomorrow. Right now, uh….” He smiled at Angel sheepishly. “If you could maybe give me fifteen minutes alone in my room.” His hips moved again, and he let out a breathy moan. “Maybe half an hour.”
And then he disappeared out the door and down the stairs, leaving Angel staring at that green glass bottle.
He closed his “eyes” and tried to find his center, but instead he heard Tucker’s noises reverberating through the boards of the house. Tucker was joyous and unashamed, and instead of locking himself away from the uncomfortable surges of human emotions that rocked his energy matrix, Angel found himself going adrift.
Tucker moaned, and Angel was lost in the sound, lost in the vision of Tucker’s body, naked and exposed, while Tucker stroked his own erect cock in a long-fingered fist.
Would one hand be on his chest? Angel was fascinated by his chest, by the dark hair against the pale skin, by the nipples that were such a delicate pink. Would he be pinching his nipples? Would he tease himself?
His moans escalated, and so did Angel’s imagination. Would he cup his testicles? Angel had been a voyeur more than once in this place, and even Ruth had stumbled upon some sexually charged artifacts. Angel had seen men do this, had seen them roll the tender balls delicately under the skin of the scrotum. Would Tucker touch himself underneath? Would he—
Another moan, this one deep and soul-ripping, and Angel let out a little moan of his own, closing his eyes and appearing on Tucker’s dresser. He kept his head, stayed invisible, but he saw, and it was just as he’d imagined, except he hadn’t thought of the sweat shining from Tucker’s flushed skin or the scent of semen and perspiration that saturated the air.
Or what it would do to Angel to see Tucker’s legs spread lewdly while he tried to penetrate himself with a spit-slickened finger.
“Oh yes!” Tucker cried out, and Angel took another breath, disappearing again and reappearing on the kitchen floor, close enough to hear Tucker scream, “Oh hells yeah!” but not in the room, not seeing him spurt seed all over his hand and his abdomen and chest.
But he imagined it. And he wrapped his imaginary arms around his imaginary knees, rocking back and forth and wishing, wishing, oh, wishing…
For that part of being human he’d assumed he could never have.
HE WAITED another half an hour and then went back to sitting on top of the dresser.
Tucker had turned out the lights in the kitchen and the bedroom by the time Angel got there, and had visited the tiny adjoining washroom as well. But he hadn’t bothered to put on pajamas, and in spite of the blanket wrapped securely around his shoulders, Angel had no doubt that he slept naked. Angel watched him for a while, picturing every sweep of skin, every mole, every imperfection under the bedclothes, until he realized that he’d started timing the breaths of his imaginary body to the breaths of Tucker’s real one.
He finally conceded to exhaustion and closed his mental eyes to sleep.
When he awoke, Tucker was already up and dressed. He’d left the sheets in a predictable tumble on the bed, but he’d cleaned up in the bathroom after he shaved. He’d shoved his clothes in the drawers, but the suitcases were still standing open in the middle of the floor.
Angel narrowed his eyes and sighed. He’d rather suspected Tucker wasn’t the kind to clean up after himself—but then, if he was waking up with someone new a lot, why would he get into the habit?
“Angel!” Tucker