He Shelved My Designs, Then Crashed Into My Bed novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Monday

Ward walks into Rett's workshop with a deadline, and Rett kneels at the bench to prove he cannot be bought.

"Mr. Bonneau," Ward said from the workshop door.

The plane in Rett's hand skipped off the board and took a curl out of the wrong place.

Rett looked at the ruined edge of the ash.

It was Monday, ten past nine, and he had not slept since the inn.

He had driven home from Edisto with the window down and his neck on fire.

He had told himself the stranger was a man he would never see again.

Now the man stood in his shop in a charcoal suit, with sawdust settling on his shoes.

Behind him Dell leaned in the doorway with a sandwich, watching them both with the flat patience of a cat.

"He says he's not a customer," Dell said.

"He isn't," Rett said. "Dell, go to the lumberyard."

"We don't need lumber."

"We do now. Take the truck. Take your time."

Dell looked at Ward, looked at Rett's neck, and took his sandwich and left without a word.

The truck coughed in the yard and pulled away.

Rett set the plane down on the bench, very gently, because otherwise he would throw it.

"You have a lot of nerve," he said.

"I've been told." Ward had not moved from the door. "I didn't sleep either."

"Good."

"The board votes on December first," Ward said. "If the fourteen designs aren't finished and signed by you, my uncle sells the production license."

"Sells it to whom?" Rett asked.

"An importer called Pallas Furniture."

Rett stared at him.

He had imagined many things Ward Gibbes might say if they ever stood in a room.

None of them had been a schedule.

"Pallas makes things out of particleboard," Rett said.

"Yes."

"You're telling me this the morning after you fucked me."

"I'm telling you this as soon as the shop opened." Ward's gaze dropped to Rett's neck and stayed there. "That mark is mine."

"It's going to be there Tuesday."

"Good."

Rett had a chisel in his hand without remembering picking it up.

"Two years," he said. "I sent your lawyers drawings. I sent them letters. I called your office line until they changed the number."

"They didn't change it," Ward said. "I did."

"That's supposed to make it better?"

"It's supposed to be true."

The mouth that had been on Rett's throat all night said it without any expression at all.

Rett took one step forward and made himself stop.

If he went any closer, he would either hit the man or kiss him.

"The thirteenth chair is the one I'm proudest of," he said. "Where is it?"

"Safe."

"Where?"

"I'll answer that after December." Ward came a step into the room. "I need the rocker, and I need your name on all fourteen."

"And then?" Rett said.

"Then they get built your way," Ward said.

"You have not once in your life built anything my way."

"No. I'm asking."

"You're asking." Rett laughed, and it came out ugly.

"You come in here in your three-thousand-dollar suit, with my cum still on the inn's sheets, and ask me for a favor."

"It wasn't my sheets," Ward said.

"Don't."

"It wasn't a favor, either. It was an offer."

"An offer," Rett said. "Of what?"

"Everything the line is worth. I don't want to bury it, Bonneau. I need your hands."

There was something in the way he said hands that made Rett's face go hot.

He put the chisel down.

He looked at the man in front of him, tall and clean and exact.

He thinks he can buy me, Rett thought, and with one good night.

It made him furious, and under the fury his cock was filling.

"Come here," Rett said.

Ward came.

He crossed the floor and stopped an arm's length away.

Rett took him by the tie and walked him back until his hips met the heavy bench.

"Hands on the wood," Rett said.

"Bonneau."

"Hands on it. Don't touch me."

Ward looked at him for a long moment.

Then he laid both palms flat on the bench behind him.

Rett knelt.

The floor was cold through his jeans and gritty with shavings, and he did not care.

He undid Ward's belt with steady fingers, and his zipper, and the fine dark wool parted.

Ward was already hard.

His cock stood out thick and flushed against his grey shorts, and Rett wet his lips and saw it twitch.

"You think I'm for sale," Rett said, looking up. "Let's see what I cost."

He pulled the shorts down and took Ward into his mouth.

The sound Ward made was low and cracked and went through Rett.

Salt and heat filled Rett's mouth.

He took him deep, slow, and drew back with a lick across the slit, and Ward's hips jerked.

"Don't," Rett said, around him, and pinned them with both hands. "Hold still."

Ward's knuckles were white on the bench.

The wood creaked under his grip.

Rett worked him the way he worked a joint, patient and exact, finding where the pressure made the breath catch.

Under the head, a flick of the tongue.

Down the shaft with his throat opened.

Ward swore in a voice Rett would have bet no board member had ever heard.

"Look at me," Rett said, and pulled off with a wet sound.

Ward looked down at him.

His grey eyes were wide and black at the center, and the iron control of the boardroom was gone from his face.

"Say what you want," Rett said.

"Your mouth."

"Say please."

"Please," Ward said.

It was hoarse and open, and Rett felt it like a hand around his own cock.

He took Ward again, all the way, until his nose was against the dark hair, and sucked.

One of Ward's hands left the bench and went into Rett's hair.

Rett caught it by the wrist and put it back on the wood.

"I said don't touch."

"Rett," Ward said.

"Not my name."

"Bonneau. Please. I'm going to."

"Then do it," Rett said against him.

Ward came with a shout that bounced off the brick, his whole big body shaking.

Rett swallowed every drop and took his time letting him go.

Silence came down on the shop.

A bird sang on the roof.

Rett got to his feet and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

His own cock was an ache against his zipper, and he had no intention of letting Ward see it.

"That was the sample," he said. "Get out."

Ward was still holding the bench.

His shirt had come untucked, and the knot of his tie had been dragged halfway to his collarbone.

He looked, Rett thought with a stab of fury, like something that had been loved well.

"Midnight," Ward said, rough. "The prototype shop on Morrison Drive. I'll leave the side door open."

"No," Rett said.

"Bring the rocker."

"I don't have the rocker. I never drew the rocker."

"Then bring what you have." Ward fastened his trousers with unsteady hands. "I wasn't lying about the vote, Bonneau."

"I know," Rett said. "That's the worst part."

Ward put a plastic key card on the bench by the plane.

He walked to the door, and he stopped there with his hand on the frame and did not turn around.

"For what it's worth," he said, "that wasn't the sample."

Then he was gone.

Rett stood in the middle of the shop with his mouth tasting of another man and the card sitting by the ruined board.

He told himself he would throw it in the bin.

He picked it up and put it in his shirt pocket, and the plastic was warm from Ward's hand.

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