Every Other Weekend Read online

  “It won’t be for long,” Clayton promised her.

  Kelly glanced at him and then at the shabby room as though he’d just seen it for the first time. “I’ll send someone over tomorrow,” he promised. “Get it cleaned up. I’ve got a sister-in-law who runs a cleaning business—crime scenes usually—so she can get this place cleaned up in no time.”

  Nadine took a shallow breath. “I thought you said it wouldn’t be for long.”

  “It won’t be,” Clayton said. “But not long in legal terms is still more than a few nights.”

  It wasn’t what he wanted to say, and it definitely wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She needed to know the truth, though. If she wasn’t going to see it through to the end, it would be safer for her to go back to James now. Once she’d served her husband notice of divorce, she would put herself in a whole new category of risk.

  “More than a week?” she asked. Her expression flickered toward desperation as she looked around. “A month?”

  “I hope not, but be very sure this is what you want to do,” Clayton told her. “I think it’s the right thing, but I’m not you. It’s your life. Once we start this—”

  “I can’t change my mind,” she said. “I get it.”

  “You can change your mind,” Clayton corrected her. “You just can’t take it back.”

  She looked thoughtful. And afraid.

  Chapter Six

  “DO YOU think she’ll go through with it?”

  Clayton leaned against the doorframe and stared at the long-dried swatch of colors on the wall. They had left Nadine—sheets on the beds and the fridge half-stocked with pizza pockets and frozen dinners from the gas station—an hour ago. Clayton could have been back at his apartment by then.

  Instead here he was, cold beer in hand as he tried to guess what color Kelly was going to paint his house.

  He’d forgotten how good it felt to just give in to the bad idea and see where it took you. Or he’d tried to anyway.

  “Do you know what the best bit of legal education I ever got was?” Clayton asked.

  It didn’t sound like an answer to the question, not yet, and Kelly came in from the kitchen to give him a curious look.

  “That no crime-scene tech will ever be that helpful?” he suggested.

  “Divorce lawyer,” Clayton reminded him. “I’ve only had to deal with crime-scene techs a couple of times, and we paid them well enough that they were very helpful. No. Baker told it to me after I lost my first case—to him. He took me to Santa Monica Pier for a cheap beer and a carton of pickled mussels.”

  The advice, Clayton remembered, had stayed with him longer than the seafood had. But he thought he could leave that out.

  Kelly laughed, “Sounds like Baker,” and took a swig of beer. Since Clayton had already committed to the bad idea, he didn’t even bother to pretend not to notice the way Kelly’s mouth wrapped around the mouth of the bottle. The image of what Kelly would look like with his mouth on Clayton’s cock flashed through his head—full lips slick and stretched, his hands rough on Clayton’s hips, Clayton’s hand twisted in Kelly’s short, messy hair.

  The quick, brutal punch of lust that hit Clayton, hot in his throat and balls, caught him by surprise. It wasn’t like he was unaware that he wanted to fuck Kelly, but apparently the decision to actually do it made it more immediate.

  He glanced down at his hands and tried to dredge up the thread of the story he was halfway through. Just because he’d decided to let the bad idea play out didn’t mean Kelly was interested, not without some work on Clayton’s part anyway.

  “So, Baker told me that the three most important things I needed to know as a divorce lawyer were that the rich settle, the poor fight it out, and the crazy just want to fuck someone over,” he said. “The first two aren’t always true, but I’ve never seen the third disproved. It won’t be easy, but she’s got me. I’m very good.”

  “Modest too.”

  “I’ve never seen the point.” Clayton looked back at the stripes of paint on the wall and changed the subject. “Have you decided what color you’re going to paint in here?”

  Kelly turned to study the wall. There were three different shades of beige, a yellow, an offensively bright blue, and a purple.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Everyone likes a different color. What do you think?”

  “None of them,” Clayton said. “But it’s not my wall.”

  “Tell my family next time you see them,” Kelly said dryly, and then he handed him his beer. “Hold this for a minute.”

  Clayton took it, and Kelly kissed him. He cupped Clayton’s face in both hands, his fingers rough with calluses, and his mouth was hard and eager as he leaned into Clayton’s body. It was a confident kiss, all stubble and soft lips. But more than that, it was wholehearted. Kelly kissed like he held nothing back to save face if he were rejected.

  Hunger parched Clayton’s throat and slid under his skin until it itched to be touched. His cock thickened under his trousers, and the pulse of want settled dully just back from his taint.

  Clayton kissed back once, a rough slash of his lips across Kelly’s, and then he pulled away. He took a swig of beer and tilted his head back against the wall.

  “I would have gotten around to that,” he said.

  “I know,” Kelly said. His smile was slow and full of lazy mockery. It creased the corners of his eyes and carved the not-quite-deep-yet lines around his mouth. It was the sort of smile that looked like you should be able to taste something on it, like honey or sunshine. “I just thought you might take all night to get there.”

  “I was being charming.”

  Kelly nodded thoughtfully. “Ah. Well, it worked.”

  “Seductive.”

  Kelly hooked his fingers in the waistband of Clayton’s trousers and tugged him off the wall. Their bodies pressed together, and the nudge of Kelly’s erection pressed against Clayton’s thigh. He was all heavy muscle and bone, solidly physical in a way that was somehow more… immediate than the gym-honed bodies Clayton usually took to bed.

  “I’m seduced,” Kelly promised, and something dark and hungry laced through that lazy, easygoing drawl of his. “Can we get on with it?”

  A snort of laughter startled Clayton as it escaped him. It wasn’t actually part of his usual pickup technique, not that he’d ever really had to try in the clubs where one-night stands lived.

  “Nobody has ever accused me of moving slow before.”

  “Maybe you didn’t spend so much time talking about paint with them?”

  Clayton twisted around and set the two beers on a shelf, between a framed photo of Liam and a Captain Sparrow action figure in a Perspex box. Because of course there was. Kelly probably had sports memorabilia in his bedroom too—high school glory days preserved forever.

  Kelly wasn’t Clayton’s type. He wasn’t even in the same Venn diagram. Apparently it didn’t matter. Clayton didn’t want to know why. He just wanted to shove Kelly against a wall and show him you didn’t need to be in love to have a good time.

  He turned back and cupped a glass-cold hand around the back of Kelly’s neck. It was damp with sweat, and Clayton could feel the itch of close-cropped hair under his palm. He grazed his thumb along the heavy line of Kelly’s jaw, across the scruff of his stubble, and leaned down to slant a rough, hungry kiss over his mouth.

  “Now see, I thought you romantic types liked that,” he rasped between kisses as he slid his free hand down Kelly’s stomach to the bulge of his cock under his jeans. “All soft words and flowers, moonlight kisses and getting to know you.”

  He could feel Kelly’s grin curve under his mouth. There was something ridiculously, specifically hot about that.

  “I do,” he said. “On a date. You asking me on a date, Clayton?”

  Clayton snorted and pushed himself off the wall. He walked Kelly backward until his thighs bumped into the arm of the couch.

  “I’m not even staying the night.”

  Kelly sh
rugged and sat down on the edge of the couch to strip off his T-shirt. The bright spray of inked colors on his shoulders slid over the heavy bulk of his muscle as he moved, as though the parrot had fluffed its feathers. Clayton did what he’d wanted to do since he saw it for the first time and ran his fingers over the bright shades. It wasn’t some drunken, “spur of the moment” bit of flash. Someone had taken a long time to fit the shape of the bird to Kelly’s body, to create the smeared, watercolor stain where the blue and red bled into each other.

  “Why a parrot?” he asked.

  Kelly balled up his T-shirt and tossed it away. He hesitated for a second and then shrugged easily as he started to unbutton Clayton’s shirt. “I’ve always really liked pirates.”

  That was such an essentially Kelly reason that Clayton ignored the itch in his hindbrain that thought it wasn’t the whole truth. It wasn’t a lie either, and besides, Clayton had better things to do right then than play the third degree.

  Kelly pushed his hands up under the loose shirt and ran his fingers over the lean slopes of muscle. He pressed a wet, openmouthed kiss against Clayton’s chest.

  “I like your body,” he said. “You’re like a knife in a suit.”

  “Is that good?” Clayton asked.

  Kelly glanced up at him from under short, thick lashes. He smiled with lazy appreciation.

  “You make it work.”

  He brushed his thumb over Clayton’s nipple with a rough stroke that made Clayton hiss at the sharp prickle of pleasure. Kelly bit his lip in satisfaction at the reaction and did it again on the other side. The pluck of callused fingers made the nipple darken and swell.

  Clayton twisted his fingers in the short crop of Kelly’s brown hair and tugged his head back until he could see clear, gray blue eyes look up at him. He watched as Kelly ran his tongue over his lower lip to leave it slick and wet.

  “I like your mouth. You have a beautiful mouth.” Clayton ran the pad of his thumb over the wet curve of it, and the honesty slipped over his tongue before he could catch it. “I like how much you smile.”

  Kelly laughed. It made Clayton flinch. Offense caught in his jaw like a goad, and the prickly, throwaway kid he’d been was still close enough to his skin to get hurt. He started to draw his hand back.

  “See, I kinda like that you don’t. Smile much, I mean,” Kelly said as he dropped his hands to Clayton’s narrow hips. “It makes it a challenge to see if I can get one out of you.”

  It should have made it better. Clayton wished it were that easy. He’d be a lot less screwed up if it were.

  “You think you can make me smile?” he asked as he gave a tug to his handful of Kelly’s dark, dense hair. It pulled Kelly’s head a bit farther and pulled the line of his throat tight and vulnerable. “You’re not that charming, Kelly.”

  “Wanna bet?”

  Mischief sparkled in Kelly’s eyes, and he flicked the button out on Clayton’s trousers. He dipped his hand into the waistband, his fingers warm as they brushed across his lower stomach toward his groin.

  A groan caught in Clayton’s throat as he imagined Kelly on his knees again, mouth wet and willing around him. Except he wanted to be the one who made Kelly moan.

  “Later,” he rasped out of a dry throat and pushed Kelly back onto the couch in a graceless sprawl of inked skin and laughter.

  Clayton stepped out of his trousers. The black cotton of his boxers outlined the thick shaft of his erect cock where it lifted up against his stomach.

  On the couch, Kelly, his legs still hung over the arm, lifted his hips as he shoved his worn jeans and bright-pink briefs down toward his knees at the same time. “If you need lube, it’s behind Captain Sparrow.”

  Of course it was, Clayton thought wryly. He shoved the box aside and grabbed the lube.

  “I’ve been tested,” he said as he rested his hand on the box of condoms. “I’ve got a clean bill of health. You?”

  “Yeah,” Kelly said raggedly.

  Clayton left the condoms and squeezed lube into his palm. It was slick and cool against his fingers, cold as he reached into his boxers and dragged it along his cock. He admired Kelly, sprawled out naked and hard on the rich, brown leather, as he rubbed the lube from balls to tip. Clayton let his eyes slide over the heavy shoulders down to the narrow hips, before he finally took a good look at the hard curve of cock between Kelly’s thighs. It was a nice cock, heavy and tight with a wet, slick head.

  Arousal tugged at his muscles, a wire from his balls to his ass and heavy cables of it in his thighs.

  “Get up on your knees,” he said.

  Kelly did as he was told and stretched, all that muscle hard and fluid under tanned skin.

  “I thought the Irish were pale,” he said.

  “Black Irish,” Kelly told him with a grin. “And the yard’s really private.”

  The thought of fucking Kelly on the grass, sweaty and sun-warmed and nowhere else to be, sideswiped Clayton on its way to his go-to fantasy bank. He swallowed hard and spun his finger to get Kelly to turn around.

  Kelly visibly thought about it for a second, one hand around his cock as he looked Clayton over.

  “Maybe I want to fuck you,” Kelly said, a hint of challenge in his voice.

  Clayton’s ass clenched at the suggestion, and he felt the throb of pleasure twist like wire in his groin. He preferred to top, but there were exceptions. The thought of Kelly’s cock in him and Kelly’s hands on him wasn’t… horrible.

  Not tonight, though. This was Clayton’s bad idea, and he wanted Kelly under him, tight and begging for more.

  “I want to make you come,” Clayton said as he padded over the wooden floor. Kelly watched him with pale, unfocused eyes as he ran his thumb along his twitching shaft. “I want my name in your mouth and my cock in your ass when you come. I want you to turn around.”

  Kelly took a quick, shallow breath and did as he was told. He faced the wall and braced his arms against the back of the sofa. Long muscles clenched from his forearm and up into his shoulders. The taut bands of muscle in his back ran down into the tight, sweat-glazed curve of his ass.

  “You should get better jeans,” Clayton said as he shed his boxers.

  Kelly glanced over his shoulder. “What? Why?”

  Clayton shrugged as it dawned on him that he had no reason to give anyone else reason to crawl into Kelly’s pants. He’d had to take the ass on faith. They could too.

  “Everyone should,” he said vaguely.

  His cock was slick and slippery with lube and come, and each slow twist of his hand along the length of it sent a jolt of pleasure back to settle in his balls. Clayton bit his lip as he ran his fingers down Kelly’s spine to the crack of his ass and then inside it.

  It was still a bad idea, the outnumbered but sensible part of him muttered… but not quite loudly enough to interrupt the proceedings. Clayton acknowledged it anyway. It was definitely a bad idea, but he could live with that.

  He rubbed his lube-slick fingers around the tight pucker of Kelly’s ass in slow, teasing circles.

  “What do you want, Kelly?” he asked.

  Kelly rocked his hips back against Clayton and then raggedly admitted, “You.” He groaned. “I want you inside me. Sometime today.”

  Clayton snorted and slapped the taut curve of Kelly’s ass hard enough to leave a pink, splayed imprint of his hand on the firm flesh. He pushed his fingers inside Kelly at the same time, and the tangle of sensation made Kelly squirm and garble a curse as he stumbled over the words.

  Kelly’s ass was tight and hot as Clayton worked the lube in deeper. He shifted closer, one knee up on a cushion and one hand on Kelly’s shoulder as he spread him wider. Kelly made a choked sound deep in his throat and pushed back into Clayton’s hand.

  “I meant cock,” Kelly muttered as he dropped his head. His arms were braced and tight, all clenched muscle and fingers twisted into the cushions he leaned on.

  “You have no patience,” Clayton teased. He hooked his finger and graze
d the rubbery node of the prostate. The shudder of reaction ran up Kelly’s back and escaped him on a strangled mewl. Again, a little harder that time, and again, until Kelly’s arms trembled, and his elbows folded under his weight. Clayton used his grip on Kelly’s shoulder to hold him up until his arms would do the job again. “See? Good things come to those who wait.”

  Kelly snorted. “You’re a dick.”

  He didn’t add it to his tally, but that made Clayton grin as he slid his fingers free. “I thought you wanted my dick.”

  Whatever Kelly had been about to say turned into a breathless “sonovabitch” as Clayton pressed the head of his cock between lube-slick cheeks. He felt the ache of pressure throb raw pleasure back to his balls as he pushed, and then the tight grip of Kelly’s ass squeezed around his cock.

  “I like your ass too,” Clayton said roughly. He ran his hand over the curve of it and down to the heavy length of Kelly’s thigh. The clenched muscles twitched under his hand. They were so tight they trembled. “Why haven’t we done this before?”

  Kelly laughed, and Clayton felt it in his cock. It felt even better than he’d imagined.

  “Because this is a really bad idea,” Kelly said. “And usually we have better sense?”

  It was hard to argue with that. “Worry about that tomorrow.”

  Another laugh, and Kelly’s ass clenched around Clayton’s cock as though it wanted to wring him out. He set his jaw and held himself very still as he willed himself back under control.

  “Sounds more like me than you,” Kelly said.

  Clayton rocked his hips forward in a short thrust and buried his cock an inch deeper inside Kelly. Under him, Kelly gasped and flexed his fingers against the heavy leather of the cushions.

  “Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think,” Clayton said. “I could have a wild side.”

  He didn’t. It had been pruned off years earlier, along with everything else he inherited from his mother. The roots of her tendency to make bad decisions were obviously still there, but not her commitment to them.