Fighting Addiction Page 11

  “Please. Oh fuck. Please, don’t stop.” He wanted it to go on forever.

  He felt as much as heard Markus’s chuckle. That vibration almost made him crazy.

  “Bastard!” The swat to his thigh made him jump, made him cry out.

  Markus just did it again, slapping below the burning skin from last night’s marathon round.

  “Don’t. Don’t. Fuck.” So close. He was so fucking close.

  “No?” Those fingers inside him moved, pegging his gland, and another slap rang out, making him jump.

  “Please.” Markus was like music. Like the best kind of late-night jam session, smoky voices at 3:00 a.m. music.

  “Please what, baby? What do you need?”

  “Everything.” He always had. He needed everything.

  “In a heartbeat.” Markus stood, rubbing against his ass.

  The words made him dizzy, made him need to write them down, find them a melody, but more than that, he needed Markus to prove he meant them. Markus wasn’t hesitating. Not one bit. He could hear the man slicking up, the sounds wet and amazing, and then the head of Markus’s cock was pushing against his hole.

  He went to drive back onto that fine prick, but Markus had his hips, slamming into him so that fuzzy body slapped against his skin. His ass was so sensitive he swore he could feel each and every hair. Sebastian could definitely feel Markus’s breath on his nape a few seconds before the man bit him.

  “Oh fuck!” His eyes rolled, and he heard Markus grunt as his muscles clenched.

  “Seb. Tight.” Markus pinched the hot flesh right where his ass met his thigh.

  That bright sting zipped down his thigh, burning him perfectly. He panted, his arms shaking from holding him up, his breath heaving in his chest. The noise in his head was fading, only Markus and his song there.

  He nodded, encouraging Markus. Don’t stop. Not yet.

  “Gonna ride you until you scream, baby.”

  “Please. Fuck, Candy, I need it.” He always had.

  “Yes. Gonna scratch that itch so good.” The thrusts came, long and deep, the rhythm completely unstoppable. Sebastian burned, melodies flashing in his brain. Fuck, yes. He could stay, right here. Forever.

  Not that it was going to last. Not when Markus grabbed his cock and started stroking.

  His head fell forward and he humped, pushing hard as he used every bit of strength he had. The move drove Markus deeper, deeper than ever before, maybe, their bodies straining for every bit of leverage.

  “Markus!” The word tore out of him.

  “Fucking love the way you say my name, baby. Love it.”

  Those words and the slam of Markus’s cock against his gland pushed him right up to the edge. He only needed the tiniest shove. He came, his vision fading out, the only sound in his ears Markus calling him love.

  It was the most perfect moment, and he wanted to hold on to it.

  Those strong arms held him up, kept them stable, even as the bus moved. Markus thrust a few more times, jerky now, losing the thread. Then the man came for him, moaning his name like it was a chorus to a really good song.

  Sebastian held on to the sounds, soaking them up. Drinking them in. He had to remember this.

  “Damn, baby. That was a hell of a way to start the day.”

  “Uh-huh.” It had been… stunning.

  Markus pressed a soft kiss to the back of his neck, making the bite mark there sting.

  “We’re not being careful. You good with that?”

  Leaning against him, Markus nodded. He felt the way that bristly chin rubbed on his skin. “I tried to be good with the rubbers, but I got to tell you, man, it’s been a long time, and I’ve tested clean since.” Candy wouldn’t lie to him. Not about that.

  “I’m clean, Candy. I wouldn’t give you anything.” Shit, he loved the man. And that hadn’t been what he was talking about anyway. He was talking about their lives.

  “Well, there you go.” Markus didn’t seem worried.

  “You mess up my schedule these days.”

  Markus palmed Sebastian’s butt, making him wiggle. “Does that give you stress?”

  “It probably should, more than it does. I’d scream at anyone else.” Was that normal?

  “Well, if I start giving you too much, you say so.” That hand squeezed, making his toes curl. “I know just the way to relieve it now.”

  “You’re crazy-making.” He meant that in the best possible way. “We should shower. We’re all sweaty.”

  “Sure. I like your shower. Need to get one of those on my bus one of these days.” Stepping back, Markus stood and pulled him up.

  “What do you have?” He hadn’t been on Markus’s bus.

  “Pretty standard shower with a fancy jet head.” Laughing, Markus muscled him into the bathroom. “I had to get a new bus when we contracted this tour.”

  “I live in here, when I’m in the States.”

  “You don’t have a place here at all, right?” Markus stopped, stared, Seb’s lack of roots still amazing him. “Didn’t you have a place in Nashville once upon a time?”

  “No. I stayed here or in a hotel. Mostly here.”

  Markus stared until he ducked his head. Then Candy started the water and got them into the spray.

  What was he supposed to say? Do? “I’m not a freak.”

  “I never said you were, baby. That just sounds rootless.” Markus started washing him, voice carefully neutral. Not like humor the lunatic or anything. Just plain old even and calm.

  “I am rootless. I’m a musician. We don’t get roots.”

  “Hey, I get it. I like my house, though. It has my studio.”

  “I liked your house.” He would have liked to have seen more than the studio, really.

  “Next time you’ll stay with me, huh? We’ll go, and I’ll even make Helen leave you be.”

  “Stay with you, like in your house?”

  Markus pulled back to stare at him, dark eyes serious as a heart attack. “Yeah. You’ll like my bedroom.”

  “They’ll catch us. It’ll happen. You know that.” And when it happened, Sebastian wasn’t sure he could walk away again. He was older now, more in love. Sebastian laughed a little. He was more OCD or whatever. If Markus worked into his routine, it would kill him when it changed.

  “I’m willing to chance it for you, baby. This time I know what the stakes are.”

  Sebastian’s mouth went dry, and he just stood there. What the hell did you do when someone offered you the thing you want most? He thought he might fall over.

  “You don’t have to say yes or no right now, baby. We still got tour dates.” Those hands started moving again, soaping him up.

  “You’re the one. You. No one else. Eight years and I never once found anyone close.” Sebastian fought to breathe. “I’m dreaming, and you’re in your bus, right?”

  “Nope. No dreaming.” Markus kissed him hard enough to let him know this was real.

  Shit, Sebastian wasn’t sure he was ever going to sleep again. He didn’t want to miss anything, and he might just have to prop his eyelids open with toothpicks, like in the cartoons.

  “Baby?” Markus washed Sebastian’s belly. “You okay?”

  He thought about the question for a long time. “I don’t know. I…. I’ve lived a long fucking time running from wanting something, and now you say I can have it. Shit, I’ve built a whole career on lying about everything and trying to feel something.”

  Did that even make sense?

  He was fucking exhausted and more than a little scared. What if this wasn’t real? What if he was making it up? Shit, Markus had made him sleep in a whole other house in Austin. Markus had been the one to say they couldn’t do this. What if he was making this all up and he did something—touched the man or said something and then Markus lost his shit? What if Markus walked off stage and just left him there with all those people staring at him, wanting a piece of him? Like monsters, all just wanting to tear a piece off of him and eat it so they got thei
r pound of flesh.

  He could see that, clear as a bell, the mass of people with their claws and their teeth, hunting him and the guys, hungry for a bite. Just one bite. And then one more and one more and one more and one more and one….

  “Hey, baby. You’re shaking. Seb? Come on. Let’s go sit.” After turning off the water, Markus dried him off and led him back to his bed, eased him down. “What can I do?”

  “I just… I missed a dose of my pills, I think. I’m just….” He was on a schedule. Pills. Work. Music.

  “You had some. Do you need a shake? Some pineapple?” Those eyes were almost black, staring into his, Markus looking worried but not scared or frantic or anything. That was good, right?

  “I don’t know.” He sighed and looked at Markus. “This whole thing, with the meds, it’s complicated. They stop working and they just give me more, but the working part doesn’t last as long anymore.” And he was so tired, all the time.

  “Maybe we ought to back off the meds, then, try something else. I think I can help.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t….” His voice lowered. “I get a little weird without them.”

  “Oh, hell, baby. You missed it when I quit drinking.” Markus held up a hand when he opened his mouth. “I ain’t saying it’s exactly the same, but I was pretty sideways.”

  “I start imagining shit. Doctor says I just have to take them, but… man, it ain’t supposed to be like this, is it? Either flying so high you can’t see or just having to have every second be full?” He snorted. “And shit, I’m bitching. What the fuck can I bitch about? Everybody wants to be me.”

  Everybody but him.

  How spoiled was that shit?

  “Yeah, but you can burn out, baby. Everyone can, even with the best job on earth.” They snuggled, the world seeming less abrasive all of a sudden. “We’ll work on it.”

  “Oh God. Okay. I need to close my eyes a minute.”

  “Then close your eyes, baby. I’m right here.” Markus held him, and somehow it made the world go away. Sebastian chuckled. He’d write that, but it was already a song.

  Chapter Thirteen

  MARKUS COUNTED pills, then put them back into the bottles with tiny clinks.

  Sebastian had cut back by almost a third in the last few days, and Markus couldn’t be more proud. Hell, Bev seemed torn between relief and abject panic. She didn’t know what to do with a sleepy, eating Seb.

  Of course, Bev hadn’t been dealing with the paranoia, the night sweats, the hysterical phone calls searching for a goddamn paraglide company in Arizona that did full moon flights at 2:00 a.m.

  Markus figured she deserved three days off. Hell, he’d decided to take a night off the bus and get them a goddamned hotel room. In-room hot tub, giant bed, room service delivered to the antechamber, where no one could see anyone but Bev signing for it….

  Sebastian was sleeping in the Jacuzzi right now, head back and bubbling away. Markus could see those cute-as-hell toes bobbing on the other side of the tub from Seb’s head. He grinned, thinking of going and tickling those toes, when he heard his cell ringing back in the bedroom.

  That was his girl, and he needed to talk to Tawny anyway. He hadn’t seen her in days, and he missed her face. He scratched his belly, making a mental note to fish Seb out before his blood pressure dropped through the floor. Twenty minutes maybe. He shut the bedroom door halfway and grabbed his phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Scooter. How’s it hanging?” She sounded like a slice of home, husky and somehow always laughing.

  “Not bad at all.” The last few days had been up and down, but he’d gotten to spend them with Seb, so he wasn’t gonna complain. “How are you, lady?”

  “I’m doing okay. Chilling out, working. Normal stuff. How’s the tour going? I haven’t heard any complaints from anyone lately. It’s sort of creepy. I’m waiting for disaster.”

  “Lord, don’t say that.” He chewed his lip, trying to decide how much to tell her. Thing was, he’d found it was always best to be honest with Tawny. His manager had always had his back. “You ought to know. Seb and I, well, we’re, uh—running hot.”

  “Yeah?” He didn’t hear a lot of surprise in her voice, but there wasn’t any censure either. “Well, it is good? I mean, you’re happy?”

  “I am. I think he is too, but this is a messed-up thing he’s got going, Tawn. He’s running on fumes.”

  “Is he…? Is there…? I mean….” She sighed, and he could see it, her blowing her hair out of her face. “What’s he into? I can’t help if I don’t know.”

  Markus listed the names of the drugs he’d read off the pill bottles. “Antidepressants and ADHD stuff. All prescription. It’s a hell of a cocktail, though.”

  “Uh-huh. You. Look, I hate to be awful, you know I do, but…. Is someone prescribing them?”

  “His doctor, yeah.” Markus peered out to make sure Seb was asleep. “Tawny, he never needed this stuff before. Remember? When I was self-medicating like crazy, he was the sane one.”

  “Honey, the schedule he’s on…. I’ve talked to Jack. Did you know he has another eighteen shows booked immediately after y’all are done? He won’t even get a single day between y’all’s curtain call and a slew of outdoor venues. Then he gets something like four days before he’s supposed to go to Japan or somewhere and do promotion for a crazy tour right after Christmas, and there’s supposed to be the promo for y’all’s album, a new album for him, contract negotiations for the label.” She sighed softly. “A normal human can’t live like that. It’s not possible, not and be sane.”

  “No. I know.” Sebastian needed a break. “Can you talk to Jack again, get him to back it off?”

  “I’ll try, but you have to figure that he knows, at least a little.”

  “I know.” He hated that. Jack was part of the machine. But the man wasn’t evil. Was he?

  “Do you want me to call around, see what you’re dealing with, I mean, healthwise?”

  “I’d rather you went to Dr. Michaels.” He had a doctor who had helped him out a lot. A naturopath. The man was extremely discreet.

  “You got it. I’ll get back to you ASAP. Now, is there anything you need, Scooter? Doughnut delivery? Massages?”

  “Oh God, I could murder a doughnut. Or a kolache.” Surely they were close enough to Texas to get one of those amazing Czech pastries.

  “You got it, honey. You know I love you.”

  “I know.” He wasn’t one for big emotional things, but he cleared his throat. “I’m glad you have my back, Tawn.”

  “Forever, Scooter. Go relax and recreate.”

  “Thanks, hon.” He hung up, feeling less overwhelmed, less alone. It was probably time to go fish his lover out of the tub too.

  Seb was still in there, sound asleep, body twitching restlessly.

  Markus went to him, drawn to that beautiful body and to the obvious distress. He had a feeling Seb was coming down some, and he remembered detox all too well. He eased into the hot tub, hands sliding along Seb’s legs.

  Seb’s eyes popped open, the look panicked for a second. “What’s wrong with the bus?”

  “Nothing, baby. We just had one extra night, so we decided to live it up, remember? We hit the road tomorrow.” He petted, trying to get Seb to relax.

  “Right. Right. I was dreaming.” Seb shivered. “I need to go for a run or something. I’m always asleep.”

  “You’re okay.” He tugged, watching as Seb floated up. Then Markus pulled the man into his lap.

  “Mmm. Hey.” Seb looked surprised every time Markus touched him.

  “Hey, baby. Nothing wrong with catching up on some sleep.” They would work out a little later on, just to keep things going.

  He’d made sure the fucking scale was left on the bus. God knew Seb could stand to gain a pound or… hell, fifty? Maybe? The body he held was too light by far, all skin and muscle. Markus thought maybe the bones had been replaced by pineapple.

  “I guess. Things will pil
e up. God, you feel good.” There were almost normal-sized pupils. Almost. Hell, Markus had turned the lights on in the hotel room once, even, and Seb had just blinked like an owl instead of hunting sunglasses.

  He just kept touching—it wasn’t sexual, just giving Seb sensations that were good, easy. Reminding both of them how much good could come from just being.

  Seb leaned, cheek on his shoulder. “What’s your favorite song?”

  “To sing or of all time?”

  “Yes.”

  Markus chuckled, giving that some thought. “I love to sing ‘Silent Love.’ My favorite classic is ‘Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.’”

  Seb nodded. “That song was written for you.”

  “What?” He pulled back to look Seb in the eye.

  Seb went bright red. “It was written for you.”

  “How do you—” Markus stared. Hard. “You wrote it, ‘Silent Love’?”

  Seb wouldn’t meet his eyes, red face going purple.

  Markus traced the ink worked into the skin of Seb’s belly. “That’s why this, huh? Jesus, baby, I never knew.”

  “That pseud is a secret. I needed to write it. I needed to hear you sing it.”

  “I’ve always loved that fucking song.” He squeezed Seb hard, moved beyond words, really. That was his song—now more than ever. Meant for no one else.

  “Let’s get you out of here, huh?” Markus felt incredibly protective at the moment, unbelievably tender. He stood, lifting Seb out of the tub. Seb dangled for a second, and then they headed for the towels, the heavy, thick soft robes.

  They settled together on the bed, the couches just not comfy enough for both of them. Markus wasn’t feeling the need to get busy; he was more interested in just holding on.

  Seb turned on something on the television, something silly and mindless, quiet. They piled up the pillows and rested together, bodies heavy and lax, murmuring nonsense to each other. It felt like they were a couple. Like a real couple.