The Lost Boy, page 25
“Yeah, yeah.” Ben stole the last piece of toast and didn’t apologise for it.
The listening party was mostly a press thing—they’d done the fan service with the gig at Buck Shot. Melissa wanted to build on the buzz from the gig and start getting the industry as excited for the album as the fans were.
Ben was strangely not nervous for this one. At previous launch parties, he’d been so anxious he’d thrown up backstage before it started. Not now, though. He wasn’t sure if Stan’s influence was keeping him calm, or his conviction for the music on this album. It told a story far more concisely than anything they’d released before, and he was sure no one would disagree that this story was about how they’d gone from a band on the brink of collapse, to having healthy relationships again.
He was proud of that story, and of his hand in it.
With Stan’s help, Ben had arranged to borrow the pink suit from Nadia to wear to the party. She’d even tailored it to fit him and found a perfect, translucent white shirt to wear underneath it. The whole thing was totally outrageous, and Ben loved it. He wanted people to notice him for the right reasons tonight—because their band was fucking amazing, and he was in a good place. Rather than all the bullshit that had been written about him over the past year.
Stan had used his connection with Olivia to borrow a Gorges Hobeika, silvery white gown that was embellished with thousands of crystals on top of an intricately patterned fabric. With his pale skin and blond hair, he looked ethereal in it.
Or he would, if he stopped messing with his eyelashes and got ready to leave.
“Babe, is my wallet in there?” Ben called. He’d left his jeans in a pile when he’d had a shower. Oops.
He’d still been asleep, napping in Stan’s bed, when Stan started getting ready.
“Yeah. You want it?”
“Yeah. Is there any cash in it? We might need it later if we want food.”
Ben finished lacing his shoes and stretched his legs out, shaking his whole body like he did when he was getting ready for a gig. This felt like a performance, just a different kind.
Stan walked out of the bathroom looking more incredible than Ben had ever seen him before. Despite the beautiful dress, he’d gone for a fairly masculine look with hard eyebrows and strong cheekbones. Stan would mess with people’s minds tonight, those who fell anywhere on the sexuality spectrum. Ben loved it when he did that.
Stan paused in his digging through Ben’s battered wallet.
“What’s this?”
He pulled out a little baggie, one that had probably had coke in it at one point. There wasn’t coke in it anymore.
Oh.
Ben stepped up close so he could pluck it from Stan’s fingers. The ring he’d given Stan a long time ago was inside.
“It’s your ring,” he said softly.
“You kept it.”
“Of course I did.”
Ben carefully took it out of the bag and rubbed it between his fingers. Stan hadn’t left anything else behind when he’d cleared his stuff out of the room they shared at the house. Just the ring. It had taken Ben a while to find it, on Stan’s bedside table, just left there.
“Why?”
Well, that was a loaded question. Ben decided to answer it honestly. “To remind me of everything I’d lost. Of everything that mattered to me.”
He thought about asking Stan if he wanted it back. Then he had a better idea, and leaned forward to kiss Stan softly on the lips, mindful of his makeup.
Then he sank to one knee. “Will you marry me?”
Stan’s jaw dropped. And he hesitated. Ben knew he’d carry that hesitation with him for the rest of his life.
“Yes.”
Ben barely managed to stand up again before Stan was throwing himself into Ben’s arms.
“Don’t cry, baby,” Ben murmured, kissing Stan’s brow, his cheek, his lips as he wrapped Stan up close. “Don’t cry.”
“I’m not crying, you asshole.”
That made Ben laugh. “Come on, let me put it on you. I know I promised you diamonds, once upon a time. I’ll have to go and buy you something better.”
“Don’t you dare.” Stan’s hand was trembling as he held it out. “This is ours.”
“Yeah. It is.”
He’d seen the ring resting on Stan’s finger hundreds, thousands of times before, but it was different now. Back then it had been a symbol of their relationship, of trust and honesty and love. Now it was all that and more.
Stan cupped Ben’s cheeks in his hands. “I love you. So much.”
“I love you too. I promise I won’t let you down.”
Stan kissed him hard, and Ben reached around to grab Stan’s ass.
“No. If you start that now, we’ll never get out of here.”
“We could just not go.”
“Ben, it took me almost three hours to get ready. We’re fucking going.”
Ben laughed again and took Stan’s hand, rubbing his thumb over Stan’s knuckles. And his ring. Which was back where it was supposed to be; on his hand, in their bedroom, in their forever home.
“Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
“Come on, then.”
They were late getting to the party, of course, but late was part of Ben’s MO, so Melissa wasn’t even surprised. The driver she sent to pick them up wasn’t surprised either, and didn’t say anything about Stan crawling onto Ben’s lap and refusing to move for the journey over to a very chic venue in SoHo.
Melissa was waiting for them outside, clearly a little stressed.
“Hello, darling,” Stan said as he walked over to her. “You look lovely.”
Ben glanced over. She was wearing a black leather dress. He looked back at Stan.
“One day, just one day, you’ll do something that doesn’t cause me to have a nervous breakdown,” she said, poking Ben in the chest.
“I asked Stan to marry me.”
“I said yes,” Stan added.
Melissa looked like she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Congratulations?”
“Thank you,” Stan said brightly. “Should we go inside?”
The event was already buzzy enough that no one really noticed that they were late. The last launch event had been a very chill, low-key affair in a back room in some dingy LA bar, where everyone wore jeans and tried to be cool. Summer had been the one to suggest they make this one a black-tie event. Something a bit more grown-up, for once.
There was a pretty obvious juxtaposition between the back-room gig they’d done for the fans, and the fancy party that was for the journalists. Ben thought they were subtly telling the industry what they really thought of them, though who knew whether that would come across.
Ben had had a tumultuous relationship with the press for a while now. While Jez fought for them to be taken seriously as artists, Ben had fought to not be labelled the “bad boy” of the band. That had started way back in the beginning, when he was still with Stan, even before anything else kicked off.
They weren’t the fucking Spice Girls, and Ben hated being categorised based on his timidity in the face of prying interviewers. Unfortunately, his introversion and anxiety came off as arrogance. Those interviewers had quickly learned to direct questions to Summer and Jez if they wanted content they could actually use.
Since things went downhill with his addiction, Ben had found himself the subject of tabloid speculation more often than he liked. And of course they didn’t know the first fucking thing about his life, but that never stopped them making up stories to fit the pictures some arsehole paparazzi had taken. He’d been romantically linked to supermodels and sports stars, actors, artists, and a bank manager. No one seemed to care that most of these people he’d never even met.
So walking into a room of bloody music journalists wasn’t something that filled him with joyous anticipation. Though knowing he could do it with his fiancé on his arm made up for that.
Melissa had invited less than a hundred people to the event, wanting to keep it small and exclusive. People knew the album was coming out, and the first single would be released to radio stations in the morning, so it wasn’t exactly a secret. Ben thought it could maybe even be fun.
He spotted Tone near the bar, holding a glass of whiskey and talking to a guy who was probably someone Ben should know. He squeezed Stan’s hand and worked his way through the dim room until they were hovering where Tone could see them.
“Excuse me,” Tone said, and came over to them. “What’s got you two looking like the cat that got the cream?”
“Got something I need to ask you,” Ben said. He wrapped his arm around Stan’s waist and tugged him closer.
“Alright.”
“Will you be the best man at my wedding?”
Next to him, Stan chuckled. Tone looked between them comically.
“Are you shitting me?”
“We shit you not, Tone,” Stan said seriously.
“Well, fuck me. Of course I will.”
Ben let himself be pulled into one of Tone’s most bone-crushing hugs, then looped Stan in for good measure.
“Could have bought him a nicer ring, mate.”
Ben rolled his eyes. “That’s Stan’s fucking ring. The one he always used to wear.”
“So it’s like a sentimental thing?” Tone turned to Stan. “I don’t know if you heard, love, but he’s loaded now. Make him take you to Cartier or Tiffany’s or something.”
Stan leaned in so he could kiss Tone on the cheek. “I will,” he said, and winked at Ben.
Chapter Twenty Seven
When they stumbled through the door to the flat—their forever home—Stan still liked calling it that—he immediately kicked off his shoes and groaned.
“I really need to start acclimatising my feet back to wearing heels again.”
Ben caught him around the waist and gently pulled his hair to one side to kiss Stan’s neck.
“I like you whatever you’re wearing. But you looked incredible tonight.”
“So did you. Who knew hot pink was your colour?”
“Fuck off,” Ben muttered, making Stan laugh. He turned in Ben’s arms and lifted his hands so he could gather them into Ben’s hair.
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Mr Novikov.”
“Not for much longer.”
Ben pulled him in closer still and started to sway from side to side, dancing to a song only he could hear.
“You’re going to change your name?”
“I figured I would.” Stan kissed the corner of Ben’s mouth. “Unless you want to change yours?”
“I’ll take your name. I don’t have any fucking hang-ups.”
“We can figure it out later.”
Ben’s lips were on Stan’s before he’d even finished getting his words out. They needed this, needed to connect with deep, searching kisses. Stan plastered himself to Ben’s front, holding them close together while Ben’s hands found Stan’s ass. It was really only a matter of time.
“How the fuck do I get you out of this dress?” Ben mumbled.
Stan laughed and kissed up the side of his neck, making Ben shiver. “Give me five minutes, then come upstairs.”
“I can get you out of your clothes, Stan. Or I can bend you over and fuck you in the dress too. That’s definitely an option.”
“Five minutes,” Stan repeated, then carefully extracted himself from Ben’s embrace.
There was no way he was letting Ben get come on a Gorges Hobeika gown. Though Stan was very definitely turned on by the idea, if his cock poking at the inside of the dress was anything to go by.
He went straight to the bathroom and carefully got out of the dress, then hung it up on the back of the bathroom door so it could be sent for dry cleaning in the morning. The dress was possibly the most beautiful thing he’d ever worn in his whole life and he’d be sad to see it go.
He was excited, though, to slip into something far more suggestive than a sparkly white dress.
Some of the underwear he’d bought in Harrods had already made an appearance, and Ben was, as always, extremely appreciative of Stan’s efforts. The outrageously see-through dressing gown hadn’t yet, though.
Stan pulled on a pair of very tiny, black lace panties and shrugged the sheer gown over his shoulders. He’d taken extra care earlier to pin his hair up in a way that meant it could easily fall down over his shoulders again in big, bouncy curls.
When Stan had bought the nipple rings he wasn’t sure if he’d ever summon up the courage to wear them. They were simple rose gold hoops that pinched together—no piercing required. Stan’s nipples were very pink anyway, compared to his pale skin, and the jewellery looked good.
He chanced a look at himself in the mirror.
He looked like someone who was about to get fucked within an inch of his life.
“A girl can always hope,” he murmured to himself, then turned the bathroom light off and stepped into the bedroom.
“Sorry, love. Game over. I think I just came in my pants.”
Stan tipped his head back and laughed.
Ben had taken his suit off and hung it up in its suit bag, bless him, and had apparently decided to take off everything else while he was at it. The tattoo on his side was healed now. Stan liked it a lot. It felt like a positive symbol of how Ben had moved on.
“You’re so handsome,” Stan said.
“Gotta make an effort. Especially when I have a fiancé as stunning as you.”
Stan walked over and crawled onto their bed. He’d picked it—a big, wooden frame thing with upright posts in the headboard that he was definitely going to tie Ben to one of these days. Stan had plans for sex. Lots of plans. For lots of sex.
He threw them all out the window when Ben caught him around the waist and pinned him to the bed, his cock very hard against Stan’s thigh. He rocked his hips forward as if to prove a point.
“Are you trying to kill me?” Ben murmured as he licked up the side of Stan’s neck.
“I wanted to look nice for you.”
“You do—holy shit, did you get your nipples pierced?”
“No,” Stan said, but arched his back to show off his chest. “It’s just jewellery. Do you like it?”
Ben answered by licking one of Stan’s nipples while thumbing at the other.
Stan felt the moment his cock got too hard to be contained by the flimsy panties and bounced hard against his stomach. He lost sense of time as Ben worked him over, licking and teasing until Stan wondered if it was possible to actually come from this alone.
When Ben flipped him over, Stan wriggled his chest against the sheets to get friction on his sensitive nipples from the fine cotton instead.
“Did you know, there’s nothing in the whole world that turns me on more than lifting up your skirt to suck your cock?”
Stan hid his smile in the bed sheets.
“You’re a degenerate, Mr Easton.”
“Oh God, yes.”
He hitched up the sheer dressing gown to rest around Stan’s waist, then wriggled Stan’s underwear down and off his legs.
Stan had been hoping for it, but it still felt like a surprise when Ben spread his cheeks and licked lightly over Stan’s hole. His whole body felt like it was dialled up to eleven, things that shouldn’t be sexy suddenly were, and he wanted nothing more than to be fucked until he was screaming Ben’s name.
“Ben, please,” he groaned.
“Nuh-uh. Wanna get you all wet for me.”
“Zhopa,” Stan muttered into a pillow.
“Fuck, you know I love it when you curse at me in Russian.”
That made Stan laugh, though it quickly turned into a groan as Ben curled his tongue into Stan’s ass. Ben held Stan’s hips at an angle that meant he couldn’t thrust against the bed for friction against his cock, though his sensitive nipples were still getting plenty of attention from their once-innocent sheets.
It didn’t matter how much Stan begged and moaned, or in what languages, Ben seemed determined to lick and suck at his hole until Stan either came or passed out. Both seemed like viable options.
Finally, fucking finally, after what felt like forever, Ben shifted until he was kneeling and pushed his cock into Stan’s hole. Except he didn’t stop, like he usually did, just kept going until Stan felt like he was going to feel Ben’s cock poking at his lungs, Jesus Christ. When his hips fell flush against Stan’s ass, Stan moaned again.
“Are you going to fuck me now?”
“Only if you ask nicely,” Ben murmured, leaning forward to kiss the side of Stan’s neck.
“Please. Please.” The second one came out on a sob.
Every time they came together like this, it was like they were making something new, something that was theirs and so completely perfect. Stan closed his eyes and let his trembling body just feel… to immerse himself totally in making love with his boyfriend, in their bed, in their home.
Ben kept it slow and easy at first, letting Stan’s body adjust as they came together again. But he didn’t need to be careful with his body like they used to, and too soon it wasn’t enough.
Stan pulled the flimsy gown off and tossed it over the side of the bed, wanting to feel Ben everywhere, skin on skin. Ben’s hips snapped against Stan’s ass, driving his cock at just the right angle to send sparks flying down Stan’s spine. He needed this.
“Fuck. Fuck!”
“Okay,” Ben said, his voice breathless. “Hang on….”
Ben wrapped his arm around Stan’s waist, then slowly rolled to the side so he was spooned up behind Stan, on their sides. Like they used to, right back when they first got together and Stan was too fragile for much else.
“I used to dream of making love to you like this,” Ben murmured. “I wanted nothing else but you in my arms, to be inside you, to love you….”
They rocked together, slow and sure, because Stan knew this. It wasn’t something his body had forgotten, despite how thoroughly he’d buried all memories of Ben, both good and bad. Both hurt too much.
Ben closed his hand around Stan’s cock and rubbed his thumb in teasing circles just under the head, toying with Stan’s foreskin and sliding it back and forth. Stan grabbed hold of his wrist, needing to be touching Ben wherever he could.
