Ha. If people only knew! The thought of the grapevine getting hold of the real juicy scuttlebutt almost made her laugh as she took the elevator back to her own office.
Chris didn’t call her.
She refused to go back to his office and add more juice to the rumor mill, so she called him and left one voice mail message, sent him one text message. Goddammit, he was ignoring her.
He was going to ignore this problem until Dag was gone and it was too late to do anything about it. Stubborn, stubborn, stubborn!
But why was she pushing him? She knew the risk she was taking. Maybe whatever happened, happened, and it would all be for the best. Impotent anger rose inside her, though, and in a stellar display of passive-aggressiveness, she left the office half an hour early and took the train home. Without Chris.
Dag had polished off the better part of a bottle of Scotch provided by room service–not one of those useless little bottles out of the mini bar–and was thinking about going down to the hotel restaurant for something to eat when he heard the knock on his door.
Who the hell was that? He hadn’t ordered any more booze, although that wasn’t a bad idea. He climbed to his feet from where he slouched in the chair, lurched across the room. Without bothering to check through the peephole, he yanked the door open.
Chris.
His heart stopped.
He stared.
Then his heart slammed in his chest like a sledgehammer. “What are you doing here?”
Chris stood there in a damn suit and tie and stared back at Dag through baleful, shadowed eyes.
“Oh fuck,” Dag groaned, shoving a hand in his hair. “She told you.”
“Yeah. Let me in, asshole.”
Dag stepped aside. Chris walked by him, filling the hotel room with his presence.
“Look,” Dag began. “I told her not to tell you. I don’t want you feeling sorry for me. I’m fine. I’m always fine. I—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
Dag snapped his mouth closed. Chris stood there, body tense, hands clenched. He didn’t exactly look happy about all this, but that definitely wasn’t pity shining in his eyes.
Dag narrowed his eyes at his friend. “Don’t tell me what to do,” he snapped. “You kicked me out, now it’s my turn. Get out.”
“You’re drunk.”
“I am not.”
“Yes, you are. Jeez.”
“So what? I felt like getting shitfaced. What’s it to you?”
Chris rolled his eyes.
“And why’re you here anyway?” Dag planted his feet apart and folded his arms across his chest, frowning at Chris.
“Kassidy made me come.”
Great.
“She has this fucking weird idea that—” He stopped.
“Yeah. I know. She told me. I know she’s wrong. Don’t worry, Chris. I dealt with this a long time ago.”
“I hate this shit.”
“I know.”
Chris sighed. “I’ve been thinking about it all day. All last night too. Thinking about how I’d feel if I lost Kassidy. I love her, Dag.”
“I know.”
“It would kill me.”
“Yeah. Oh, goddammit, you do feel sorry for me. Jesus Christ, Chris…”
Chris took three steps across the carpet and was in his face, his fist grabbing hold of Dag’s T-shirt. “I don’t fucking feel sorry for you, all right? Would you get off the damn pity train?”
Dag thrust his arm up between his body and Chris’s, dislodging his grip of his shirt. He shoved Chris away from him.
“Hey!” Chris stumbled but came back at him, shoved him back. Dag grabbed hold of him, fury and frustration boiling up inside him, boiling over, out of control, and he swung at Chris’s face, connecting with his jaw. It wasn’t the hardest punch, Chris holding on to him too, but Chris grunted and swore.
They wrestled, shoving, trying to land punches, a haze of red in front of Dag’s eyes, until Chris hooked one foot around his leg and took him to the floor. Hard. Stars sparkled in front of his eyes, his breath whooshed out of him. “Fuck you!” He drew back to pummel Chris, and then realized Chris had him pinned beneath him on the floor. Chris outweighed him, not by much, though their strength was probably evenly matched, but Chris was looking down at him, his face only inches from his, breathing heavily. His pupils exploded, his lips parted.
They stared at each other.
The world shrank away, Dag’s awareness narrowing to the face in front of him, the hard body pressed to his, the heat of Chris’s skin scorching him, Chris’s eyes burning him.
“Fuck you,” Dag whispered. He reached a hand up, grabbed Chris’s tie and yanked his head toward him until Chris’s mouth smashed into his. Chris made some kind of sound, something deep down and agonized, and then Dag’s heart nearly exploded as Chris kissed him back.
Their mouths moved against each other, hard, grinding, teeth knocking, opening wider. Dag’s tongue plunged into Chris’s mouth, bringing another tortured sound from Chris’s throat.
This couldn’t be happening. Dag’s head spun, his hands tightened on the other man. Chris. Chris. Oh god, it was Chris, kissing him, and fuck, it was heaven.
Their tongues slid, Dag nipped Chris’s bottom lip then licked it, sucked his tongue into his mouth until Chris gasped. “Jesus.”
This was probably another fucking huge mistake he was going to regret, but he couldn’t stop now, couldn’t stop breathing, couldn’t stop his heart from beating, couldn’t stop kissing Chris.
He’d dreamed of this. He’d beaten off thinking about this, he’d fucked other men pretending they were Chris. He’d wanted this, always, this man, with everything he had–his body, his heart, his soul. With a long, deep groan, he rolled, pushing Chris’s heavy body off him, moving over him. His cock surged to life, and he pressed against Chris’s pelvis as he kissed him again and again, brutal, ferocious kisses of pent-up need and repressed longing.
“Fuck you,” he whispered again against Chris’s mouth. “I don’t know whether to love you or hate you.”
“I’m leaning toward hating you right now,” Chris gasped.
“Don’t try to tell me you didn’t want that. Jesus, you are so fucking stubborn.”
Chris said nothing.
Dag looked down at him, their chests heaving against each other.
“Christ, Chris. Don’t do this to me.”
“I don’t know what the fuck I want! All right?”
They stared back at each other, silence expanding around them, only the sound of their rasping breaths filling the room, Chris’s green eyes wide, his lips wet and shiny.
Fuck he was gorgeous. Dag closed his eyes briefly against the sight, and against the mix of emotions swirling in Chris’s eyes–denial, confusion, arousal.
Chris finally said, “Get the hell off me.”
“No.” And Dag kissed him again. Long, sliding kisses, savoring the feel of Chris’s mouth under his, Chris’s tongue in his mouth, in case this was the last time, the only time he ever got to do this. He cupped Chris’s jaw, slid his other hand into his hair, the strands short and silky, his skull large and firm beneath.
Dag’s cock throbbed insistently, sensation sizzling over his flesh, need stabbing into his balls in sharp, hot spears. Fiery heat built inside him and he rocked his hips urgently against Chris, shifting so he could feel…oh yeah, Chris was hard too. He might be confused or in denial or who the hell knew what he was feeling, but his body wanted this even if he didn’t.
Dag shoved Chris’s suit jacket out of the way so there was less fabric between their hot skin, slid a hand down and rubbed Chris’s erection, straining beneath the fly of his trousers.
“Jesus,” he breathed into Chris’s mouth. “You’re so fucking hard.”
Chris groaned, turned his head away from Dag’s mouth. “Dag…”