Helping Hands (and other body parts)

Jamie’d gotten good at gauging when Lamar was in a Mood. He hissed like a set of leaky pipes and swore under his breath in Spanish. For a Mood (caps and Italic), he hissed in Spanish, right out loud. If the hisses were directed at the closet, it meant he couldn’t decide what to wear. If he hissed in the kitchen, they were out of either chili or nachos, or both.

Today the hisses blasted out of the breakfast nook, punctuated by a string of Spanish too rapid to follow, though Jamie picked up on the shitty piece of shit part. He glanced within and saw Lamar hunched over his laptop’s keyboard and casting aspersions on the screen’s ancestry. Aha. This must be a Writing Mood, no doubt prompted by a deadline.

Since he wasn’t the target, Jamie deemed it safe to enter. Just the same, he stopped just beyond what he figured must be Lamar’s strike range. “Lemme guess. Trouble with the latest masterpiece.”

Lamar hissed like a punctured helium balloon and spat a dirty word at Windows 7. “Those limp bastards. They won’t fuck!”

“Uh, who won’t … what you said?”

“Esteban and Carlos. They had dinner at that fish place Carlos likes, Esteban’s got him down by the river, the moon is high, the wolves are singing, and now Carlos won’t put out. What is wrong with you?” he yelled at the words on the laptop’s screen. “Esteban’s your mate! You two are destined to be together! Can’t you even kiss him, for fuck’s sake?”

“How’s his breath?” Jamie asked. “Did Esteban rinse after dinner?”

Lamar hitched around on his chair to stare at Jamie. “This is a romance. It’s a fantasy. Bad breath doesn’t factor in.”

“Maybe Carlos just ain’t in the mood. Dog knows I been there,” Jamie added in a mutter.

“Que?”

“Maybe Esteban’s coming on too strong. He bein’ all bossy and alpha wolf and acting like a jerk?”

Lamar frowned at the screen. “Well … kind’a … ”

“Thought so.” Jamie nodded. “You do tend to write to a type. Esteban should just back off for once and let Carlos take the lead.”

“Carlos is King Wussie when it comes to romance. By the time he makes a move they’ll be too old to lift a finger, let along anything else."

“Why not give the boy a chance? He might surprise you.” Jamie crossed the intervening two strides to the laptop, and Lamar. “Lessee what we got here. Oke-doke, got it. Esteban’s frustrated as all get out ‘cause Carlos ain’t responding. But Carlos wants to get it on, he just don’t know how. He’s just as frustrated, only he don’t know how to express it. This is his mate and he’s all put out. So he figures what the hell, and he screws up his guts and makes a move.”

He slid his arms around Lamar from behind. Lamar hissed, but it didn’t burn like the acid hisses he’d been spitting at the screen. This was thin and surprised-sounding. Jamie grinned and nuzzled Lamar’s slender neck while running his hands up and down the snake-shifter’s slender torso. “Esteban ain’t expecting this, so he just kind’a stands there.” Like Lamar was doing right now.

Knowing how much Lamar like the feel of fabric on his skin, Jamie used his partner’s own clothing as a wipe-cloth and gave Lamar’s chest a thorough rubdown. He took special care over Lamar’s ribs; the snake was ticklish there. As an extra added bonus he flicked his tongue around the cup of Lamar’s ears in addition to the nuzzling. “Think Esteban’d go for this?” he purred.

Lamar hissed something. Jamie couldn’t make out the language, but he could hazard a guess from the tone.

“Carlos ain’t a dummy,” Jamie went on. “He can see what he’s doing to Esteban. Now he’s getting all hot and bothered to, so he picks up the pace a bit.”

Jamie knelt in front of the chair and eased Lamar’s legs apart. All he had on was a shirt and some boxers. Jamie lifted Lamar an inch off the chair and teased the boxers off before setting him down again. “Esteban just kind’a sits there,” Jamie said. “He’s the one does all the business usually. He ain’t used to getting it. Am I right?”

Lamar made a gurgly sound. Jamie chuckled and went to work on the inside of Lamar’s thighs. His legs were slender as a dancer’s, but made of solid muscle. When those legs wrapped around your hips, you weren’t going nowhere. Those muscles were trembling now, like most of the rest of Lamar’s body. Not in fear, oh nosiree. Jamie’d been on the receiving end of play enough times to know how the script was supposed to play out—and when to tear it up and throw it out.

He eased his kneading, petting fingers closer and closer to the lips of the pouch that concealed Lamar’s reptilian cock. Jamie pushed his nose in for a thorough sniff. He traced his tongue along the sensitive seam of the pouch, then puffed a breath on it. Lamar shuddered all over. “Didn’t know Esteban could make a noise like that,” Jamie murmured against the moistened lips. “He like it sitting up or lying down?”

“Fuck Esteban,” Lamar croaked. The pouch’s lips pulled back and Lamar’s Dreaded Hooded Cobra thrust its snout out of its den and went prodding around for the source of delight. Jamie kissed it hello. He would have done more, but Lamar lurched off the chair and bore him down to the linoleum. In an instant Jamie found himself trapped in his lover’s twining embrace, with Lamar’s hips grinding against him. His own Big Bad Wolf slammed against Jamie’s pajama bottoms, howling for release.

Then Lamar got the pajamas off, and Jamie lost track of the plot.

# # #

Some time later, both sweaty, panting partners levered themselves up off the floor. “Did it work?” Jamie said. “We bust your writer’s block?”

“We busted something,” Lamar said with a grin, rubbing his hip. “I think I can finish the scene now. But then I’ll have to edit. Run upstairs, grab a shower, and get that tight ass back here in half an hour. Esteban’s going to want an encore. He’s one insatiable dude.”