A Royal Christmas Cruise (Stonewall Investigations Miami 2.50)

“And where are you from?” I asked, trying hard not to stare openly at his lips.

“Born in Osaka, Japan, before my mom moved to be with my father. He’s American—they met when he was teaching English over there. We moved to Miami when I was around two.”

“I love the time I’ve spent in Japan. Haven’t gotten to go to Osaka but I had a blast in Tokyo and Kyoto.”

“Ohh, Kyoto is beautiful, isn’t it? The Buddhist temples are something else.”

“They sure are,” I said. “Do you go back to Osaka often?”

“We try to go back once every two years or so.” He cocked his head, smiling at me in a way I couldn’t quite read. His eyes bounced from mine to my lips. “And you?” he asked, “What brought you all the way from Spain? Is this holiday cruise really that popular?”

I laughed, toying with the cap on my head. No one had walked past our little nook, making this moment feel all the more private. There weren’t even any voices around us. I wondered if people were already beginning to board.

“I heard there would be five-star entertainment on the ship. Something about an extremely attractive man in tiny and slightly see-through banana underwear.”

“Okay, they weren’t tiny.” Shiro cocked his head, his lips pursed into a tight smile. “That tiny. And maybe they were slightly see-through.”

“Let’s just say, I could tell your banana doesn’t have the peel on it.”

Shiro’s eyes opened wide, his cheeks turning rose-petal red.

“Joking,” I said, wondering if I’d gone too far. What had pushed me to go that far? We’d only just met and I was already making dick jokes…

“Well, your joke isn’t exactly far from the truth.” Although Shiro’s cheeks still blushed, his stance and his gaze radiated confidence. He crossed his arms, his chest muscles perking up, his biceps looking larger, too. He licked his lips. I wondered if it was subconscious or calculated. If he knew how crazy he was beginning to drive me. “Did you enjoy the preboarding show? Are you leaving me five Yelp stars?”

“I was considering it, but I felt like it ended too soon. May drop it down to four.”

“Oh yeah?”

“I could have watched for hours. I only got barely a minute.”

“Well…” Shiro moved closer to me. My heartbeat began to thrum louder and faster. I wondered if he could hear it in the encapsulating silence of the bookstore. “Maybe I can do something to bump up that review. Five stars.”

“For?”

“For this.”

He had read me, as if he had picked me up from one of the surrounding shelves and flipped through my pages. He knew I wanted him, as badly as he seemed to want me. No more wasting time. I couldn’t explain it if I tried, but on the same token, I felt like I didn’t have to. My entire life had been centered around me explaining myself. Having to answer to everyone else’s expectations, never considering my own. Never taking into account what I really wanted, for fear I’d upset everyone else around me. That ended with my empty relationship. I was done with wasting time. That’s what this trip was about: living my life the way I wanted to. I made that choice on the morning I had walked home from Hightower Bridge.

And right now, I wanted to make out with the sexiest man I’d ever laid eyes on in the seclusion of an empty bookstore.

His lips grazed mine, tentative at first, his hand coming up to my head, mine to the back of his neck. Our heads moved to a silent beat, finding the rhythm we could both dance to. He tasted like a candy cane, minty and fresh. I wanted more of it. More of him.

My tongue licked at his lips, fanning the flames that consumed me from my toes to my scalp. He parted for me, allowing me in, giving me more of his taste, more of him. I took it, probing him with my tongue, his other hand moving from my hip to my ass. I felt a shock run through me as he squeezed, pushing me onto him. A moan rose from me, uncontrolled, one he greedily swallowed.

The kiss exploded, faster and more passionate than anything I’d felt before. It hit out of nowhere, like a bolt of pure lightning striking from a cloudless and sapphire-blue sky.

But before we could get carried away and start a fire with all this kindle around us, I knew that I had to stop. This had been beyond risky. This bordered on insane. Sure, I could live life on the edge, but this was us plummeting off the edge. If anyone got a photo of this, I would… fuck. I don’t even know what would happen.

When we broke apart, our lips still shiny from the kiss, I looked past Shiro, hoping against all hope that there wasn’t someone at the end of the aisle with their camera phone aimed at us, reeling in a story that was bound to sell for thousands.