It had a nice ring to it.
Again, I was trying to help him become financially stable without actually writing him a check. He had helped me out several times in college and I only wanted to return the favor. Even if nothing else came out of it, he finally understood why I always resisted taking what he offered back then.
He wanted to get ahead on his own merits. Just like I had in college.
I respected that.
When I stepped into the bathroom, Tate’s back was to me as he shampooed his dark hair and hit a wrong note while singing Oops!… I Did It Again badly. Especially with the accompanying dance moves.
Since he didn’t know I was there yet, I smothered my combination laugh-groan and let him get in a few more moves before I joined him and those moves changed to “oops!… we did it again.”
A large soaking tub sat in front of one of the huge picture windows. I had used it myself maybe twice before recently spending plenty of nights in it together after sex. With the lights dimmed, we could see the view of the city and we’d talk—about everything and also about completely nothing—until the water went tepid.
But the shower in which he was currently putting on the equivalent of an elementary school talent show was the pièce de résistance in the room that opened up to both the main bedroom and adjoining massive walk-in closet.
The shower was state of the art with multiple shower heads and massaging jets and surrounded with glass. When I designed it I added so many fancy features that I never used most of them before Tate came back into my life. Now, we found reasons to use them all.
Before Tate, I showered and got out. I only occasionally lingered in it even though it was built like what he called an adult waterpark. All those years I played alone in it. Just me and my fist, assisted by my fantasies. Hell, my memories.
But those memories had always been empty comfort. They weren’t good company and had made me feel even lonelier.
Worse, the memories you wanted to hold onto the tightest tended to fade away the quickest.
The memories you wanted to forget tended to haunt you forever.
Our goal was to replace those memories with new ones. Even better ones.
And we were about to make one more.
He rinsed the soap from his hair and turned to find me staring at him with amusement. At least it got him to quit butchering one of Britney’s most popular songs. “Your shower always makes me feel like I’m a snack in a display case.”
“You are a snack, T.”
Streams of water rolled down his face as he pointed a lopsided smile in my direction and wiggled his dark eyebrows. “One good enough to eat?”
“Always.”
His smile, when not forced, had always made him glow and had been infectious. It still was. A precious gift that one can only hope for and be lucky enough to receive. When he gave that gift to me, I always tried to give him one back.
“Are you hungry?” he asked.
“Sure am and I’m about to remedy that.” I pulled open the glass door and stepped inside. If we were into it, we could fit another half dozen men in there with us.
But I was never sharing Tate again. With anyone.
Stepping under one of the shower heads, the stream of hot water beat against my skin, quickly washing away the dried sweat and cum clinging to me.
Before I could pump body wash from the dispenser attached to the single tiled wall onto my palm to clean myself up thoroughly, Tate was doing it first. When he stepped toe to toe with me, his mesmerizing blue eyes framed with the thick, wet lashes locked with mine. “Turn around. I’ll wash your back.”
It seemed like Tate was hungrier than I was.
“Turn around,” he demanded again when I didn’t move fast enough.
“The shower’s big enough that you could give me a wide berth, T. It’s not like we’re fighting for real estate in here.”
His lips twitched and he shrugged. I’d discovered he loved giving me orders to see if I’d follow them.
I sighed with feigned impatience and, of course, did what he wanted.
Tate (Now)
I swept my handful of soap across his broad, muscular back. His skin the perfect canvas for his ink, the same as his chest and both arms. One night I had explored each and every one of those tattoos and he’d explained why he got it and if it had any deep meaning behind it.
Since he had a bunch of ink, that explanation took a good bit of time. But as he talked about them, I had touched each and every one with both my fingers and my lips.
I squirted some shampoo from the wall dispenser onto my palm, then dumped it on top of his head before getting more body wash. He washed his hair while I washed his ass, taking my time to tease him before moving up and down both legs, spinning him around and scrubbing sudsy water over his chest, arms, shoulders and face.