Rivalries: Chapter Eleven, Part One

 Notes: Busy week, busy week, even though me and the fam are staying home together for the holiday. For those of you celebrating, Happy Thanksgiving, and please, please, please be safe.

Title: Rivalries: Chapter Eleven, Part One

***

Chapter Eleven, Part One

 

Charlie thought it would take a lot to surprise him these days, given the fuckery he’d lived through so far, but he still managed to be surprised right down to his core when he got a text the next morning at 5 a.m. from Johnny: Sorry, can’t make it today. That was it—not a word of explanation, just a quick, pithy apology and that was that.

Welp. Looked like he was on his own when it came to getting to school today. It was still early enough that he’d make it if he took the bus, but…

Everything okay? he texted back before getting out of bed and heading into the shower. He soaped up slow and careful, like he had to with the stitches still in, but the bruises were honestly feeling a lot better already, even after yesterday’s crater of a revelation. He felt…like he’d slept, really slept, without the zinging pangs of his knack’s untapped energy coursing down his nerves and keeping him awake. It was such a relief, he almost didn’t know what to do with himself. Even his morning erection, long vanished due to poor sleep and poorer dreams, had perked up today.

He ignored it as best he could, got out, dried off and impulsively checked his phone to see if Johnny had gotten back to him. Nothing. Shit. And here he’d thought the other man might be someone he could rely on. Someone he could…it didn’t matter.

He couldn’t stop thinking about it on the way to school, though. It was weird, going from having no close contact with anyone but his PT and being pretty okay with that to feeling weird just by being apart from Johnny, but that was where he was at. Hardly any time had passed at all since they’d come together again, and he was craving it. Was Charlie that starved for attention? “I need to get out more,” he muttered, even though he already knew he wasn’t going to. Get out in what? With whom? His nonexistent car, his nonexistent friends?

Pity party, table for one.

He folded up his petulance and hurt as the bus pulled in a block away from the school, grabbed his briefcase, and headed in to work.

Concentrating on his classes was easy—the kids might be little shits sometimes, but they were his to teach, and he was going to make sure they knew what they needed to whether they resented him for it or not. The seniors had had their first dueling session and were abuzz about it, more than happy to tell him about it and, in some cases, hammer home what he’d missed.

Honestly, it sounded pretty rote as far as Charlie was concerned. Face off—starting with similar knacks, for simplicity’s sake—and take slow, directed shots at each other, nothing to startle a knack out of alignment. Sure, it was just the first day, but still…they weren’t going to get far dueling, much less have an easier time of it in the military, which this was supposed to be preparing them for in the first place, without making it more interesting. There was something to be said for building confidence in the beginning, but there was also a lot to be said for working on specifics that would be good for the individual.

Mentioning that didn’t help, though. “Colonel Applegate is one of my dad’s friends,” said Willard, puffing out his chest importantly. Jesus, could this kid get any more self-important? “An actual colonel, not a sergeant like you were. He said my shield is one of the best he’s ever seen.”

Sure, mkay. “That good, huh?”

Willard scoffed. “Professional level, he said. Probably better than yours.”

“Yeah?” Charlie was about to do something unwise, something really dumb, but he’d already had it with today. “Okay, then. Move me backward.”

Willard had frowned while the rest of the class giggled and stared. “What?”

“Move my chair backward by, oh, no more than a foot. That’ll take a decent shield. You don’t have to do it,” he added. “Technically I’m not allowed to offer my input when it comes to practical demonstrations, but—”

“I can do it!” Willard shot out of his chair and held his hands out in the classic diamond pattern. Charlie, meanwhile, tapped into his knack with his right knee and left hand and prayed that he wasn’t about to blast his own ass into the air.

“Go ahead,” he said. Willard concentrated, gathering his knack, and then—

It sizzled out of his hands like a wave of blue lightning, hitting the desk and blowing the papers on it all over the front of the classroom.

It didn’t move the desk, the chair, or Charlie, though. His stasis shield had held. Stasis shields were weak shields that could hold you in place for a while—maybe long enough to hang onto a ceiling if you needed to sneak into a compound—but they only worked if you were completely still. He hadn’t cast one in over a year. Still…not bad.

“Woops.” He looked at the rain of papers, then out at the rest of the class. “No laughing,” he warned. “Unless you want to try your knack out too.” Some of them shifted in their seats, considering, but no one took him up on it. “Good.”

He lingered after class because why not, his bus wasn’t going to come for another forty-five minutes, and gradually his petty satisfaction at making a shield trick work again faded as he thought of Johnny. After ten minutes of staring at his phone wondering if he dared try calling him, Charlie pushed back his chair and stood up. He was done with this, he’d go walk around until the bus—

“Hey, Charlie!” Debra tucked her head around the corner of his classroom door. “Glad I caught you today. Any word on a source for equipment?”

“Yeah, I’ve put out some feelers,” he said, then did a double-take. “How did you know Principal Cross turned down using the stuff here?”

“Text from Johnny—Mr. Gibilisco, you’ve met him, yeah? He told me not to worry, but…” She shrugged. “It’s what I do.”

“He texted you? When?”

“Last night. Also let me know he wasn’t going to be in today.” Debra shook her head. “Damn treatments he has to get. They keep him going, but the attacks are almost completely random.”

Treatment? Attacks? “What’s wrong with him?” Charlie not-quite-demanded.

“Not sure. It’s been going on ever since he came to work at Stheno.” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Why do you care? Do you know him?”

“Yeah, some. We…we went to Stheno together. We were…friends.” Not back then, not really, and he wasn’t sure what they were now, but friends worked as well as anything.

“And he didn’t have this problem back then?”

Charlie shook his head. He hadn’t, but—shit. Had Charlie done this to him, the time he knocked him into the hospital? Had he damaged him permanently in some way?

“Well, I don’t know what to tell you. He’ll probably be back tomorrow, unless it was a really bad one.” She sighed, then nodded. “See you later, Charlie.”

“Bye.” He didn’t linger in his room any more. His feet carried him, not to the bus stop, but in the opposite direction toward the little market at the corner a mile away.

It couldn’t be that difficult to find out where Johnny lived without calling, could it? No wonder he’d been terse—he was probably in the hospital. Shit. If he really was back home by this evening, though…

Well, then Charlie could make sure he was comfortable. That was all.

Rivalries: Chapter Eight, Part Two

 Notes: Back to Johnny! Who has figured out another way to spend time with Charlie, not that he's deliberately trying, not at all...next time, we get some Charlie at school POV. Because it's time to get back to the kiddos.

Title: Rivalries: Chapter Eight, Part Two

***

Rivalries Chapter Eight, Part Two

 

 

 

It occurred to Johnny, once he was five minutes from Charlie’s apartment and taking another pull of coffee from his travel mug to wash the last lingering muffin crumbs out of his mouth, that he probably should have brought some coffee for Charlie. That would be the polite thing to do, wouldn’t it? He was picking the guy up at “too-early-in-the-morning” o’ clock, the least he could do was not be an asshole about it by drinking coffee in front of him. He could have brought him a muffin, too. Johnny had way too many, and seriously, Lora’s daughter needed to stop giving her zucchini, because even mixed with chocolate and baked into a delicious treat, it was starting to be excessive.

Johnny stared at his coffee mug. It was, oh, half full? And he had three minutes left on his arrival clock now? “You can get it down,” he told himself, and began to chug.

Bad idea, bad idea. The insulated mug kept the coffee so hot that trying to take anything other than a tiny sip resulted in burning the roof of his mouth, then his tongue. He swallowed to stop from spitting it all over the steering wheel, and regretted the decision as the liquid burned a path down his throat and into his belly. Johnny coughed and coughed, almost unable to watch the road because his eyes were blurring with tears. You are an IDIOT. He searched his mind for a knack that would help with idiocy, or conversely, physical discomfort, and came up empty. Great.

The burn had faded a bit by the time he got to Charlie’s apartment building. Which number was his again? It was going to be an awkward fucking morning if Johnny had to get out and start knocking on doors before the sun was up…but wait, no, there was Charlie, materializing from out of the shadows like some sort of wraith. There had been a kid at Stheno in their year who had a wraith knack—shadow melding, the closest thing to invisibility anyone knew about yet, and an ability that the army doctors would absolutely love for Johnny to be able to copy. He hadn’t managed it yet. Was it because he genuinely couldn’t, or because he knew subconsciously that, if he did, he’d never be a simple school counselor again?

Maybe a little bit of both. Either way, he needed to pick up his shadowy passenger. Johnny pulled the car in by the curb, reached over, and unlocked the door. Charlie got in and settled down with a sigh, placing his briefcase between his feet. He had two travel mugs of coffee, one balanced on top of the other, in his right hand. “You look like you’re probably good, but just in case,” he said, and set one of them in the free cupholder space before taking a long sip from his own.

He sounded…tired. “Rough night?” Johnny asked as he pulled back onto the road. The traffic was still pretty light—they’d make it to Euryale with plenty of time to spare. And then he could make his excuses to Principal Cochrane and head for the courthouse. Awesome.

“No rougher than usual.”

Johnny scoffed. “Dude, please. You were in a car accident yesterday, that has to have made whatever your normal sleep is like worse.”

“You don’t know what my normal sleep is like.”

I wouldn’t mind finding out. Johnny said a quick prayer of thanks for the fact that Charlie didn’t have a mental knack, then refocused. “Is it the kind that can be improved by blunt force trauma and whiplash?”

Charlie laughed tiredly. “No, actually.”

“There you go.”

Neither of them spoke for a few minutes, and Johnny wondered if that was going to be it for the whole ride when Charlie said, “Too much stuff whirling around in my head for me to sleep. I mean, the concussion doesn’t help, but I get nights like this sometimes, when my brain is stuck in a loop and I can’t seem to get out of it.”

“That sucks.” Johnny had experienced something like that a few times, but he’d always been able to “jerk” himself out of it, so to speak. Generally, and thankfully, he slept pretty well. “What were you thinking about?”

“Shit, what wasn’t I thinking about?” Charlie laid his head back against the headrest and closed his eyes. Johnny took advantage of the moment to look at him. Even as haggard as he seemed right now, with the bruises and dark circles and the fucking stitches, he was still unfairly handsome. “I was thinking about the inconvenience I was going to put you through in the mornings, thinking about how I’m going to have to save up for a car or try to get a loan—and I have a shit credit rating, thanks to being overseas for so long and never having to buy anything—thinking about what the fuck I’m going to do about PT and getting home in time to talk to Ari and his mom…that sort of thing.”

That was…a lot. Johnny hadn’t even considered extracurriculars or things like that, for either of them, when he came up with his brilliant rideshare scheme, but he should have. Not that Johnny had any regular entertainments or appointments, but he had plenty of irregular ones come up. This morning being a case in point.

Maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe you should just make it a one-day thing. Or one week. But Johnny already knew he couldn’t do that. This was his fault, and besides that, it seemed like what Charlie needed even more than a ride was someone to spend time with who wasn’t a student or physical therapist or…whoever Ari and his mom were. “I can take you,” his mouth said without his express permission.

Charlie almost jolted upright—damn, had he been about to fall asleep? Johnny should have kept his mouth shut. “What? No, that’s—that’s too much, you’re doing too much already.”

“Are you kidding me? You’re going to need PT now more than ever—” maybe a little less hyperbole, all things considered, genius “—and it wouldn’t inconvenience me.”

“Oh yeah?” Charlie challenged. “Sitting around in a waiting room for an hour three days a week won’t inconvenience you?”

Johnny shrugged. “I can use the time to make phone calls and do paperwork. I’d be doing the same exact thing at home, except surrounded by muffins. Waaay too many muffins.”

Charlie’s eyes narrowed. “I can’t tell if you’re trying to be funny or just being weird.”

“The muffins are a real thing, and also a funny thing, and weird…” Johnny shrugged. “I am who I am, I guess. Weird is definitely a part of that. If you really don’t want the help, I won’t force it on you, but I’m offering. My hours can get really fucking weird sometimes, though,” he warned. “So it’s going to be you waiting on me in all likelihood at least half the time.”

“I can handle that.” Charlie sounded almost surprised, like it was a confession that had just slipped out. “Um. Are you sure?”

As sure as I can be without hitting myself with the ol’ Willpower knack. “Yeah. I’m sure.” Johnny reached down and took a sip of his coffee. It was comfortably warm now, he’d be done with it by the time they got to school.

And he had his second cup already waiting for him.

“Thanks.”

Johnny smiled, just a little bit. Funny how a potentially huge disruption in his schedule could feel like winning something. “You’re welcome.”

New Release: Dark Around The Edges

 It's heeeeeeere! My new/old release is here!

I'm so excited this is finally out in the world again. Dark Around the Edges is an m/m urban fantasy romance with a heavy side of magic, demons, and gunfire, on sale for $2.99. I hope you enjoy it :)

Dark Around the Edges

 

Devon Harper isn't just an agent with an elite private security firm, he's also a cambion, the half-breed offspring of an incubus and a human. While on the trail of Porter Grey, a dangerous summoner, Devon's own demonic birthright betrays him and he's captured by those who want to use his heritage for evil, leaving his sometimes-partner Rio to step in and save the day. Unfortunately, their quarry is has escaped by the time Devon is freed. If they don't catch him fast, Porter Grey could once again vanish overseas and out of their reach.

As the two men begin their search, the urgency of their mission can't quite distract Devon from the growing affection he feels for Rio—the one person whose calm nature seems to quiet his restless spirit. Their hunt leads them to Seattle, but Devon is captured and Porter Grey almost killed as the demon who has been pulling his strings springs his ultimate trap. He's got plans for Devon, and unless Rio is willing to risk everything by revealing his own hidden nature to stop him, he may have found a way to become the most powerful incubus to ever walk the Earth.

Rivalries: Chapter Eight, Part One

 Notes: It's a lovely long chapter this time. Also, mildly R-rated, so if you don't like "special alone time in the shower" scenes, don't read!

Title: Rivalries: Chapter Eight, Part One

***

Chapter Eight, Part One

You’ve lost your mind. Lost. Your. Mind. It was the only reason Johnny could think of that he’d willingly volunteer to spend time with Charlie Verlaine. This isn’t high school anymore! You don’t have a crush! You have a high-maintenance job helping a bunch of kids who need you now more than ever, and they’re going to need all your energy!

It was true…but it was too late to take any of it back. And as much as he kind of hated to admit it, Johnny didn’t even want to take any of it back. The part of him that he tried to forget, the part that had had hopes and dreams that felt almost foreign to him now, bits and pieces that he’d tried to bury under work and training and more work—that part was ecstatic.

Charlie Verlaine! You get to spend more time with him!

Yeah, because he had crushed the man’s car in an effort to keep people safe. It had never even occurred to Johnny that Charlie wouldn’t be able to protect himself. He’d been so good at shielding, so strong, even back when they were still in school. When had he lost that?

Probably when he lost his arm, Johnny realized. He should have thought of that sooner.

Not everyone’s knacks were like his. That was good—Johnny had a devil of a time with his ability, and so did the scientists who were testing him left, right, and center. There was always something more to learn with his knack, and it kept him…flexible. Elastic, in a way. More like the way a child would learn to use their knack, perhaps—he couldn’t take anything about it for granted. But for people like Charlie? People whose knacks had come in young, who had been training to use them from an early age and gone on to refine their skills so keenly as adults? Losing the ability to train the way you were accustomed to could be enough to make you lose the ability to use your knack, period.

And Shields had always trained with both hands, Johnny remembered. Two hands. Not just one.

He can’t shield. Johnny frowned. And he’s teaching a class on knacks? How does that work? It had to work, though—somehow. From the look of Charlie, though, and from the look of the car he’d been driving, he hadn’t been living the life of teaching a bunch of posh little shits for very long. When had he even gotten his teaching certification? Who had gotten him the job at Euryale Academy?

These are all things you can ask him in person, the little voice in his head said mockingly. Use your words.

“Damn. Shit. Motherfucker. Oh my god, what have I gotten myself into?”

Yeah. That felt better.

It was after midnight by the time Johnny got home. He might, might get five hours of sleep, if he was lucky, before he had to get up and get ready to stare down another day. He shouldn’t check his email, he should just go straight to bed.

He checked his email. The only pressing thing in there was a new message from Camille, Roland’s caseworker. Meeting with Judge Ramsey at the courthouse tomorrow morning at nine. Sorry for the last-minute notice, but it would mean a lot to Roland if you could be there.

Tomorrow morning at nine. When he was supposed to be helping integrate over a hundred high-powered, hormone-fueled students together in Euryale. When he should be meeting with teachers and keeping principals in line and a hundred other little things that fell to a guidance counselor that they didn’t tell you about when you picked your path. Johnny wouldn’t change it for the world, but he did occasionally look at his life and wonder why he’d chosen something so time-intensive as a career, when he already had so little time to himself.

It certainly explained why he hadn’t had a successful date in far too long. Online dating was supposed to make things easier, cut out the middleman of bar or club or workplace or whatever it was. Guide you toward someone who shared your interests, that you had things in common with. So far, it had mostly guided Johnny toward total jerks.

Wonder what that says about you.

Tonight had been a total nightmare, but he couldn’t say he regretted any of it. Well, no, he regretted Charlie getting hurt, he should have found another way to stop the car. He had so many different methods at his disposal, sometimes it was hard to focus on picking one. Hesitation, that had always been Johnny’s biggest problem when it came to his knack. If he’d hesitated much longer, it could have been him in the ER last night.

He regretted Charlie’s injury, but the conversation they’d had, the little bit of time they’d managed to spend together…he didn’t regret that. Like it or not, he was interested in Charlie Verlaine. Ignoring the fact wouldn’t make it go away—it never did, not when Johnny was infatuated. He couldn’t push things aside and hope they’d resolve on their own. He had to push, to pick, to scratch and wear away until they were clear to him. Right now, Charlie was opaque. Johnny wanted to clarify him. He wanted to spend time with him, and he was going to get his wish.

He was also probably going to be exhausted, but that was his call to make as an adult in charge of his own life. And it seemed like Charlie really did need help, even apart from providing a ride to school. He’d seemed so caustic last night, so…empty. Abandoned. Why hadn’t he asked Johnny to call anyone for him? Was there no one else to call?

For all that he’d been a mess, Charlie had also looked unfairly gorgeous. He’d always been good-looking, almost pretty when they were in high school, but now his smooth, sleek jaw had lengthened a bit, and he’d grown into the breadth of his shoulders. His hair was beautiful, long and sleek, and Johnny’s fingers itched a bit at the thought of working their way through it. He was slim, probably slimmer than he’d been in the army, but still fit, still handsome despite the fatigue that seemed baked into him and the loss of his right arm.

Honestly, while Johnny had of course noticed that he was missing an arm, he hadn’t focused on it at all until Charlie brought it up, and Johnny had known a verbal trap when he saw one. No, that was a topic to be avoided for now, he got that.

Maybe not forever, though. After all, they had a lot of rideshares in their future. Who knew what would come up?

Speaking of up…Johnny groaned and looked down at his crotch. “Not now, I have to sleep,” he muttered. His erection remained insistent. Did just thinking about Charlie really do it for him? Just imagining the feel of Charlie’s warm skin, a hand maybe, stroking down Johnny’s chest while he—

“God damn it.” Johnny stalked off to the shower. Whatever, he needed to clean up after the hospital trip anyway. He turned on the water, stripped down, and grabbed his toothbrush before getting in. He brushed and soaped up vigorously and fast, then slicked his hand with bodywash and rubbed his palm over the head of his cock.

“Mmmm.” Fast and hard had never worked well for Johnny—he couldn’t touch himself like he wanted to feel anything other than softness and expect to come. He’d never welcomed pain with sex, which had been a real disappointment to some of his one-night stands who’d been hoping to spank him, or fuck him without prepping him first. Fuck them, if they wanted to take a cock up their asses without getting stretched he’d oblige, but that wasn’t going to be him.

Speaking of…he stroked down his cock and cradled his balls, rolling and tugging them just enough to make them start to draw up, then moved down. He set one foot up on the edge of the tub, slicked his fingers up, then stroked them over his hole.

“Aahh…” He touched himself there, just rubbing, circling without any pressure. It felt so good…when was the last time he’d gotten off, two days ago? A long time, for him. He leaned his shoulder against the wet tile to help support himself, then reached for his dick with his other hand and glided his fingers along the length of it. That was good, even better—fuck, did he have time to get his dildo?

No. You need to go to sleep.

Good point. Johnny focused on the sensation, just the feel of his own two hands working him over. He gently pressed one of his fingertips inside of himself, his breath catching. He didn’t need to work his prostate over—the skin around the edge of his hole was so sensitive, so pleasurable, it was enough just to touch himself like this, to curl his hand around the tip of his cock and twist, gently, to think about nothing but his own body, his own hands…well, maybe someone else’s hand as well…

Just the thought tipped Johnny over the edge, making him gasp as he came in a rush. He hadn’t meant to bring Charlie into this, he really hadn’t, but god, he felt the pleasure of that thought all the way down to his fucking toes. He eased his finger out, straightened up and grabbed for the bodywash again with a sigh.

One more thing to keep to himself tomorrow.