Jingle Bell Rock Ch. 01

Brian "Beef" Carroway thinks he's gay. No, he knows he is. He's gruff, buff, and overcompensating for his big size and soft heart. Brian's the badass bouncer at Mosh rock club where Cajun singer Jack Cotille moonlights for the month of December.

With a voice like sin, Jack is walking, talking, sexy temptation in the flesh. He's also fly-by-night, possibly homeless, and chancing everything on a wing and a prayer. Just about the only thing Brian is sure of is traveling man Jack belts out dirty rock lyrics while promising the kind of pornographic sex he's only fantasized about.

He's definitely gay for Jack.

One Christmas kiss leads to a night of heaven, a morning of hell. The holiday week leaves Brian aching for more than his wanderer singer can give as the New Year's Eve countdown begins.

1

Christmas Eve Hustler

I strode inside, the last of the partiers' IDs checked and the club at full capacity. Steam rose off my leather jacket and I stomped my feet, heavy as glaciers with wet snow the icing on top. It'd been a rare cold snap in Charleston, sleet slaking off me like a second skin. I slid out of the jacket and handed it off to Jane so she could stow it behind the bar.

Jane was the owner of Mosh, one of the most popular live music rock clubs in downtown Charleston, South Carolina. It went with her downhome, family style eatery next door: Nosh. An odd combo for the stunning late thirties-something entrepreneur but it worked.

As usual, Mosh had brought in a big Christmas Eve crowd even though it was a weekday night. The vaulted room of the refurbed cathedral busted at the seams like a pair of leather-laced pants too tight for their owner. The usual mix 'n' match hoard of customers drank, danced, and did a lot of groping in dark corners that weren't nearly dark enough. Black, deep blood red, and almost violent purple completed the color scheme. The bar was a glossy midnight color, the lights--dimmed to pinpoints set into the ceiling--looked like stars. The massive stage took up half the place and it was swarmed by a neverending wave of writhing dancers.

Jane said hi, which consisted of her bobbing the bright blond spikes of her short hair in my direction and giving a meaning-filled glance at the singer headlining the band. She kept it silent because I wouldn't have heard her over the reverberating noise of the southern rockers lighting up the stage or the roar of the fist-pumping, hip-grinding groupies on the floor.

I rolled my eyes and ignored my boss. The one who had almost the same haircut as mine, although my crew cut was more about easy maintenance and hers was about badass-bitch style. In fact, Jane and I were often mistaken for brother and sister. Same golden complexion, same brown eyes remarked upon as unusual in fair-haired folks. Of course whereas she was slender, I was a bulky mass of muscle topping out at six-foot-three, which made me an excellent resource as Mosh's one and only bouncer.

The fact I scowled more often than smiled was a bonus for the job too.

Yeah, she was totally feminine, I was completely masculine. One hundred percent man. Macho through and through. And finding out I was increasingly attracted to other men. Or man. Specifically, the one up on stage Jane had so unsubtly pointed out to me. The gruff scowl-frown expression I usually worked slid away in favor of a rare smile as I settled an elbow on the bar and enjoyed a little session of listening and staring.

In shirtsleeves and leathers, I should've still been shivering with cold. The thing that warmed me to the bone was Jack Cotille. He jammed with Cotille and the Crazy Boys, sweat slicking his shirt to his skin. Skin flushed with heat, strained by muscle as he stroked his guitar. Belting out dirty rock lyrics, Jack stoked a raging blaze in my groin.

I pounded the one beer due to me during my shift and sat my ass on a stool.

I stared at Jack as I had all month and the one before too. A moth to flame and wings incinerated by fire.

At one a.m. their session ended, the club closed an hour later, and I was free to go home. Except I kept seeing visions of Jack strumming his guitar—strong forearms clenching and relaxing, wide wrists turning and tensing. Jack, pulling up his T-shirt to wipe the sweat from his face, revealing a sectioned abdomen and a trail of dark hair from his belly button to the top of his faded, holey jeans. And sweet Christ, his bragging-rights biceps, twin tantalizing mounds of muscle I wanted to sink my teeth into. The way he'd always blow a kiss out to the crowd at the end of a set. His red mouth plump. I thought about those pursed pouty lips wrapped around the head of my cock.

****

It was the tail end of Christmas Eve. Maybe he could be my Christmas Steve.

When I laughed at myself, it was so cold at stupid o'clock on the morning of the twenty-fifth of December, the air froze in front of me in 'ha ha' puffs of breath. This time I wasn't gonna walk by Jack as I ambled along Market Street. I wasn't gonna watch him from across the road as he stood beneath the wreath-wrapped lamppost, plucking his acoustic, busking for spare change from the last of the holiday revelers winding their way home. All around, the marketplace was festively decorated, bright with colored lights, done up like a high-classed whore putting on her best finery.

But Jack's black hair and his deep blue eyes shined brighter than any Christmas decoration ever could. I wanted him off the streets and in my bed. In my arms.

Every night I'd followed him, pretending I wasn't stalking him but rather investing a healthy interest in his welfare, I'd never seen him leave in the same direction twice and I drew the line at following him home. Mainly because I didn't think he had a home and that would just break my fucking heart.

And it was Christmas.

Okay, not that the holiday had anything to do with it. I wanted Jack period, any way I could get him, and had done so since the second I'd seen him on stage at Mosh last month. He made my cock ache. He made my fists clench because I wanted to touch him so much. Goddamn, he made my guts twist with need.

Flatpicking the strings of his Hagstrom Siljan guitar with one of the picks he stowed in his back pocket or flipped between his fingers like lucky poker chips, he looked up when I approached him.

The undeviating eye contact shivered up the base of my spine.

His fingers stilled on the guitar and his voice—low and rich—melted into the air mid-riff. If he pawned that damn guitar he'd probably make enough money to quit with the busking for extra cash. Another case of beauty over brains. And had I just called the man beautiful? Yeah . . . yeah I had.

Little strummer boy.

A dash of black hair met the high slope of his cheeks, pink from the cold. The unearthly blue eyes, which always twinkled or teased, got straight inside my gonads. Innocence and sin combined in one talented package destined for fame or self-destruction. Goddamn Jack Cotille had interrupted my regimented black and white and boring life in a major way.

Every night he worked at Mosh I watched him barge out the alley door. Two guitar cases slung over his shoulders, picks in his loose back pocket, his lips tilted in an easy grin even when he huddled inside his beaten-to-hell-and-back leather jacket.

"Need a lift home?" I'd call out to him. Those four words formed the sum total of my stellar conversational skills when it came to him. What I always intended to say was: Come back to my place so I can find out how warm and delicious your mouth is, so I can find out what it feels like to touch and suck and fuck another guy's cock.

His reply was always the same too. Devil-angel-temptation. "Not unless you're ready to hit this."

And I'd stare at his ass-on-offer, the perfect curve of it cupped inside his worn jeans, so ready hit that my mind raced with the image of fucking him against a brick wall. But I never answered, my brain having decided fun fantasies were all the action I was gonna get. He'd chuckle then start to sing as he strolled off into the dark beyond the streetlights. I'd cling to the last notes of his voice. Jack's guttural Cajun accent dissolved into sexual grittiness when he sang, making every single song sound like a hot, rough, sweaty ride between the sheets. Or raw fucking in a dark alley with jeans shoved down to our thighs.

I glanced into the alley behind Jack, breaking contact with his seductive eyes before mine gave away my raunchy thoughts . . . although I supposed the substantial bulge in my pants was doing that for me. That and the rough swallow I forced down my throat.

Everything about him was beautiful. Sexual. Exotic and erotic. I couldn't tell if he was bi-straight-gay. 'Course not. I was just figuring out I was gay. If it took me twenty-six years to come head-to-head with my own sexuality, it was gonna take more than a couple months to interpret someone else's. That or a flashing fluorescent sign.

They called me Beef, my few friends, my coworkers, my boss. Huge muscles, tall body, and sides of beef for shoulders. Bouncer I could do. Boy magnet not so much. And as for the babes . . . The last chick broke up with me because I limp-dicked it with her. Eight inches of heavy cock going completely flaccid every time she took her clothes off, or kissed me, or made a suggestive remark to me. Dead weight hanging between my thighs. But say his name, play his song, let me get a whiff of his sweat . . . and I was rock hard and throbbing. Motherfucking inconvenient when I was standing out here in the freezing cold trying to figure out how to pick the man up when I hadn't even managed to say hello yet.

My guitar player watched me. He teased me with every rub up the neck of his instrument, every slow slide of his fingers down the strings. And when he flattened his palm for reverb, my cock rippled inside my leathers, prodding against the seams. Leaning over, he pocketed the loose change and few dollar bills that had been dropped into the open guitar case.

I still hadn't managed to unstick my tongue from the roof of my mouth when he came back up.

Jack peered at me, puffs of frosty air smoking between us. "Can I buy ya a cup of coffee, Beef?"

His lips were cherry red and plump-pursed. His cheeks were rosy from the cold and he clapped his hands together in front of him.

I frowned, fighting against the twin lusts to take him home and feed him, take him home and screw him. "Name's Brian."

"I thought they were just talkin' about that big piece of meat you got there between your legs." He winked, and even his wink was delicious. "You follow men around often at night?"

I chewed my lip, the usual scowl burrowing into my forehead. "Just you. I'm sorry. You just . . ." I looked up to catch his gaze, his eyes glittering with amusement. "You do something crazy to me."

"That'd be about right, seein' as I'm one of the Crazy Boys." His hand drifted up between us, tugging on the collar of my jacket before coasting across the light stubble on my jaw. "What about that cup of coffee? I sure could use a warm up."

Again I stood still, staring. I didn't want him to spend what meager offerings he had on me. When the pad of his thumb brushed my bottom lip, air whooshed from me. "I'd rather take you home with me."

Wide eyes then a slow blink before he licked the thumb that had been on my lips. Horny, horny, horny. "Should I be scared of you?"

I snorted a laugh and shook my head. The man was no frail pussy. He might not quite be able to kick my ass, but I bet he could handle himself if he decided I was taking advantage of him.

"Nah. I just . . . I can give you something hotter than coffee." Flustered again, I felt a new blush crawl over my cheeks. "Something more filling." Shit, that sounds even worse. "I meant a hot meal." Sort of. At first, at least. "And I can give you some money."

Christ. Did that make it sound like I thought he was a whore? Did I think he was a whore? All I knew about him I'd gleaned from trailing him around at night: he seemed to be a rootless wanderer. I'd never seen him with another man or a woman for that matter, only his bandmates. The way he swaggered off solo after a show, his open invitations to have at his ass . . . maybe I wondered if he traded his body for cash the same way he gave his voice in song.

"Okay." Jack hit me with a shy grin.

Okay to the money? Okay to coming home with me? Fuck it, I'd take him either way. Before he got a chance to backtrack or disappear or change his mind, I shouldered his ever-present backpack and the electric guitar case.

Tapping a black pick against his widened grin, he asked, "Eager?"

Yes. And cold. And hornier than I could ever remember. So that was just a rhetorical question I wasn't gonna answer. After he took my silence for the agreement it was, he bent over to pack away his second guitar, the Hagstrom. I really wanted to shove my hands down the back of his pants and grab hold of his ass.

My face flamed some more when he caught me ogling. There was no way to explain my shameless staring—drooling—so I simply shrugged and set off in the direction of my truck.

During the short ride to my apartment, he alternated between playing with my radio and cupping his hands over the hot-blowing air vent. I curled my fingers tighter and tighter around the steering wheel, my knuckles turning white. When I parked in front of the Charleston Single House in one of the 'bad parts' of downtown that was undergoing a rebirth—or so the real estate developers hoped—Jack swiveled in his seat.

"C'mere."

I dragged in a shaky breath. Inclining toward him, I shut my eyes at the first feel of his lips brushing the crest of my cheek, sliding toward my ear. "Don' be nervous, Beef." One hand skimmed up my thigh to squeeze the aching ridge of flesh in my leathers. "I ain't g'on eat ya. Less you wan' me too."

Oh God. The Cajun accent came out heavy when he was turned on apparently. Or maybe he used it to arouse me more. That and his hand lying atop my cock worked. Worked real well.

Pulling back with a groan, I climbed out of the truck. I grabbed all his shit—I'd keep his guitars hostage if I had to—and led him up the walkway, up the stairs, and into my apartment.

It was nothing fancy inside. None of the seasonal shit the lowcountry was festooned with from street-to-street heralding the happy holidays. On the scarred kitchen table, one fat red candle sat in a circle of holly. Merry Christmas.

Jack strolled around the three-room-plus-bath affair, his scuffed cowboy boots ringing loudly on the aged oak floors. Opening the door to the third floor balcony, he quickly closed it up tight when an icy draft swept in.

"Nice digs."

"Keeps me warm." I came from a hardcore working-class Midwestern Lutheran family—one of four kids—where we learned early hubris was an even bigger sin than in the Greek tragedies. "I took it for the kitchen mostly."

In spite of my shabby, bach-pad furniture, the kitchen was always well stocked. That room was the largest and I'd given it the DIY treatment when I moved in with a fresh coat of paint, new cupboards, the works.

Maybe that shoulda been an indicator I was gay.

Wet from the snow, his shaggy damp hair falling across his brow, Jack standing in my living room hypnotized me. He also made my brain short-out again because I asked, "You want payment up front?"

His low dirty chuckle shot straight to my straining hard-on, which hadn't gone half-mast the entire time I'd been with him. "I don't want your money, cher. And I might even suck your cock for free. If you ask nicely enough."

Holy fuck. I mumbled something and beelined for the bathroom because Jack unbuttoning his jeans while licking his lips was a combo made-to-order for my dick to blast off. Not that I was running scared from him. No way, not at all. Hitting the shower was part of my ritual when I got home from the club. Reeking of stale smoke and spilled beer, I always scrub-a-dub-dubbed. Not freaking out at all that Jack was in my apartment. Riiiight. I thrust the shower on hot, peeled off my clothes and almost beat my head—the one on top of my shoulders because I was saving the other one for Jack to beat off—against the slippery tiled wall.

A minute later, the shower door slid open and a naked beautiful man stepped in beside me. Water immediately pearled on his flesh and pooled in all the places I wanted to suck. I turned my back to the shower's spray and tried to breath with all that expansive, exquisite nudity before me. He was leaner than me, but all defined muscles. Corded shoulders, nice pecs, strong arms. The dark stubble on his jaw was like the black line from his hard stomach down until the hair curled around the base of a long, dark pink dick that stretched upward. Despite his muscled build, there was a thinness to his hip bones and around his ribs that didn't belong. I wanted to see those sinews fill out with meal after meal of decent food and full nights of rest.

Jesus. If I wasn't gay then I was turning into a woman, a mother hen at that.

I didn't approach the subject of his possible homelessness. Instead I kept with my shit-for-brains theme for the night. "Are you even gay? Or just gay for cash?"

Flipping wet hair from his eyes, he soaped up his hands and placed them on my chest. When he stepped forward, our rigid cocks touched and that time I did beat the back of my head against the wall.

"Already told you I don' want your money. And maybe I just want you. Go with it, Brian." His hands—sudsy and hot and calloused—roamed in opposite directions. One behind my neck to pull me down for a kiss that made me see double even before his tongue took a long deep trip inside my mouth. The other skirted all around my groin, avoiding my shaft until my hips moved in a pleading motion for any kind of contact I could get.

Fuuuck.

Bewildered. Wanting. Hard.

Releasing my lips with loud porn-star-style suction, Jack lathered my cock in two tight fists. I went up on the balls of my feet and held onto the top of the shower almost ready to lose it all over his teasing hands. He'd tighten his grip and I'd grunt, he'd loosen his fists and I'd curse. He took my balls in one hand, teasing my taint with a crooked finger until I panted and shuddered.

Maneuvering me so I faced away from him, he kissed along my shoulders and down the center of my back. Jack's fingers trailed wet, sudsy fire to the fanned muscles flexing there.

"Feels good, beb?"

I grunted and croaked and nodded.

"Been with a man before?" A lone finger worked its way between my tight ass cheeks, circling my entrance.

"No," I choked out. Instead of clenching and closing Jack out, I opened my stance, gasping when he grasped both halves of my ass to spread me.

His teeth bit one side then the other and his tongue dangled at the top of my cleft, fingertip circling, tapping, teasing, relaxing. "Lucky me. Sexy ass, Beef. Nice tight virgin hole."

My dick was leaking like a fucking faucet when he pulled away from my backside with a wet slap of open palm to ass. I was about to go out of my damn mind.

I turned in time to see him working up more foam between his hands before setting about cleaning himself. I wasn't about to pass up the chance to help. Hands soapy, I cleaned and caressed his pecs, his abs. I kneeled in front of him and did his feet and calves, his thighs. The inner pockets where his legs met his groin and the V of muscle slicing to his ripe, red, and heavily veined cock. I rubbed the hair on his legs and lathered his pubes and gave a short laugh when his dick bounced into my hand. He was thick, straight, uncut. The uncircumcised skin slid inside my palm, revealing a fat flushed crown, turgid and richly colored.