Thai'ing the Knot Read online

  “Yes,” Nat panted, ”but…”

  “Or this?” Ryu slid his fingers through the opening of the boxers and stroked Nat’s bare cock.

  Nat shut his eyes hard against the intense pleasure. “No,” he breathed, his head tilted back.

  “Or maybe this.” Ryu’s eyes glittered with promise. Gently, he pulled Nat’s cock through the opening and took the head in his mouth.

  “Ohhh.” Nat’s chest heaved. He wanted to rise up and push Ryu onto his back, yank down the man’s pants and mount him. But Ryu’s hot, wet mouth held him prisoner. With erotic suction, Ryu pulled the head of Nat’s cock between his lips. With the tip of his tongue, Ryu traced the lobes of the head, pulling a bit more with his lips.

  Damn. Ryu gave a blowjob that made a man his instant slave.

  Ryu closed his eyes and savoured the feel and taste of Nat’s cock. Playing the jade flute on Nat had to be one of the best, most incredible experiences of his life. Something he’d fantasised about for years as Nat’s unknown fan and now had the privilege of doing nearly every day in real life. Aside from Kiku, whom he’d always worshipped and adored, Nat was the ultimate man. The best man in the entire world. Someone Ryu trusted with his life.

  Nat’s harsh breaths thundered in Ryu’s ears, urging him to take Nat deeper. Pulling back, he released Nat’s cock and pulled the man’s jeans and boxers down so he could have full access.

  Nat helped him by lifting his ass off the bed enough to let Ryu pull his clothes off, down to his ankles. Nat’s eyelids were heavy, his already caramel-toned skin flushed dark. His full lips were parted with his heavy breathing. What he wanted, the desire he’d been trying to express, was clear in his hungry expression. He wanted Ryu on his back, underneath him, his cock buried deep inside Ryu’s passage.

  Heat, like lightning, streaked through Ryu’s body. He’d wanted to hold Nat off, make him wait until he returned, a kind of promise to himself he’d be with Nat again after this coming nightmare was over. But Ryu’s asshole pulsed. Heat radiated through his dragon, as if the organ itself were truly the fire-breathing creature after which it had been named. Aside from sucking Nat’s dragon, nothing else in the entire world compared to having Nat’s muscular body on top of his, surrounded and filled with Nat’s tender strength.

  Wordlessly, Ryu slipped Nat’s jeans over each foot and pulled them off, along with his boxers. He stroked his hands over Nat’s smooth, hard thighs. The tiny hairs on Nat’s skin brushed Ryu’s palms and Nat’s thickly muscled thighs quivered under his erotic caresses.

  Leaning in, Ryu tongued the plump sac under Nat’s dragon. Nat groaned and Ryu suppressed a smile, instead feathering his tongue over the crinkly-smooth skin of Nat’s balls. Nat never came out and said this, but his yang sac was one of his most intense erogenous zones and Ryu delighted in licking it until Nat was almost ready to come. In an erotic dance, Ryu stroked Nat’s thighs while he teased Nat’s balls and the base of his thick dragon in back and forth licks. Nat’s dragon jumped and twitched as if given a life of its own, telling Ryu without words where it really wanted to be.

  Well, he definitely wanted the same thing, but not just yet. More teasing first. Clasping the base of Nat’s dragon with his thumb and forefinger, he ran his tongue up to the head and pushed the tip into the tiny seeping hole. Nat’s dragon tears were salty sweet and Ryu savoured them, eyes closed, showing Nat just how much he loved the mere taste of him. It was as if Nat’s essence came through in his yang juices, strong and salty, yet also sweet and nourishing, the very nectar that had helped restore Ryu’s faith in life, a force he’d lost sight of since the deadly clash with Taro Suzuki.

  Mmm, he couldn’t get enough of Nat’s delectable flavours or the no-nonsense smell of his smooth toffee skin. He wanted to taste every inch. He moved his hands to Nat’s hips and moved his mouth to Nat’s stomach again. Slowly, in a moist upward trail, he licked and teased his way up the centre of Nat’s torso, taking extra time to feast on each dark nipple. The smooth disks crinkled against his tongue as if on demand and Nat’s hands burrowed into Ryu’s hair.

  “Ryu,” he breathed, “Ryu.” Each repetition of Ryu’s name shuddered inside him. Ryu moved up farther, to the top of Nat’s chest, and nibbled on every part of his collarbone before venturing to the more sensitive skin of his throat.

  “Ryu,” Nat whispered again. “Ryu, I want—nnnnhh…” The sentence was lost as Ryu took Nat’s lips. Nat’s velvety lips. Another part of the man that tasted like heaven itself.

  Ryu licked deep into Nat’s mouth, as if to gather more of the essence in there to take inside of him, to keep him going when he and Nat couldn’t be together. Even as he chafed his lips and tongue against Nat’s, deep in his consciousness Ryu couldn’t believe he wouldn’t be falling asleep in Nat’s arms as he’d done just about every night since Nat had come to live here with him.

  He felt pressure on his waist. Nat’s hands were scrabbling at the button of his jeans. The man’s thick fingers found the button hole and opened his pants. Then the fly. Then one of Nat’s large hands slipped under the elastic of Ryu’s briefs and palmed his cock. Nat loved feeling Ryu’s cock, sliding his callused palm over silky skin. Nat treated his dragon as if it were one of the most precious treasures in the world, as he treated all of Ryu everyday.

  Ryu felt hot tears spring into his eyes. Mixed in the pleasure of Nat’s hot caress on his dragon was the anguish he felt at their being apart. He paused their kiss, his lips resting against Nat’s, their breath mingling in each other’s mouths, and pushed his jeans and underpants down. Nat’s large hands closed over his arms and Ryu felt himself tilting. The bed came up under his back and Nat’s hunger-darkened face flashed above him.

  Nat pushed Ryu’s shirt up, exposing his chest. Nat wasn’t teasing and seductive in the way he descended and licked hungrily at Ryu’s chest. Nat wasn’t a refined man. He was a wild tiger, unleashed, protective and engulfing with his passion. Ryu felt this every time they made love, in the way Nat’s tongue moved over his skin, his nipples, over his throat, the way Nat nibbled at his jaw, wildly yet also carefully. “Nat, the oil’s in my bag,” he whispered, grasping Nat’s broad back muscles. The way Nat’s torso filled his arms was a pleasure beyond compare. “Please.”

  Nat lifted his face. Sweat dotted his brow. His chest heaved. He rocked his pelvis and their cocks rubbed together. Nat’s eyes widened, as if he’d been given a jolt. Wordlessly, he leant over and reached into Ryu’s bag. Ryu took the bottle from him and poured some into his own hand. Reaching down, he slathered it up all over the other man’s hard cock then over his hole. “I want you so much, Nat,” he whispered. Time was mercilessly slipping away from them and he wanted Nat inside him for as long as possible.

  He lifted his legs and wrapped them around Nat’s hips. That act alone sent an ecstatic shiver through his body. Aside from Kiku, Nat was the only man he’d done this intimate act with, not counting Suzuki’s violation, and every time he pulled his legs back, surrendering his body to the man he loved, was sacred. He grasped Nat’s ass cheeks and squeezed.

  Nat groaned. He pushed the head of his cock against Ryu’s slippery hole. The oil made the head sink in. The tiny pleasure-pinch made Ryu gasp. He pulled Nat’s head down and kissed him deeply. The air around them filled with the erotically wet suction of their mouths together…followed by the small slap of their hard bodies sliding together as Nat penetrated him and slid his cock all the way in.

  “Mmmm,” Ryu sighed in his throat, eyes closed, his arms around Nat’s broad torso, knees pulled back so Nat could plunge in deep with each thrust. Nat’s hard stomach rubbed Ryu’s dragon in a rhythm with each glide into Ryu’s deep channel.

  Ryu relaxed, opened, surrendered completely to the friction, the heat, the sheer delight of Nat on top of him, inside him, surrounding him. The two main gates of his body were filled with Nat—Nat’s tongue in his mouth and Nat’s thick dragon in his back passage. Ryu’s mind softened, darkened, as if he were floating
upward, his body carried in the very essence of consciousness itself. He’d gone there the first time he and Nat had made love back in Thailand, and even then Ryu had known there was something special, something transcendent in the way their beings mingled. Nat, too, had experienced the transcendent levels when they mixed their yin and yang forces together.

  Please, Ryu prayed silently, even in the midst of ecstasy, don’t separate us. He squeezed the muscles of his jade gate around Nat’s dragon, clutched at the man’s rock-hard ass cheeks with the fingers of both hands, pulling Nat in as deep as the man could humanly possibly go.

  It worked. Nat groaned. He thrust faster and harder. His dragon surged, filling, pulsing as the nectar shot up and into Ryu’s channel.

  The friction of Nat’s stomach made Ryu come. Together their bodies emptied their yang clouds, their mouths still joined in their deep kiss. The smell of sex emanated, diffused into the air by their sweating bodies. Nat collapsed on top of Ryu, heedless of the warm puddle that fused their skin. His large hand slid into Ryu’s hair and he rested his damp forehead against Ryu’s.

  My beautiful Ryu, Nat thought, breathing heavily in the aftermath of that incredibly hot sex. He’d felt as if Ryu were trying to pull him inside, make of their two souls one so he’d be with Nat wherever he was. He smoothed back Ryu’s damp hair, afraid to speak lest he say something stupid.

  “Tell me it’ll be okay, Nat,” Ryu whispered.

  Nat’s heart lurched. Back in Thailand, hiding from Taro Suzuki, Nat had said those words to Ryu. It’ll be okay. He’d wanted so badly to comfort Ryu. He didn’t want to lie but he also wanted to hope.

  “It’ll be okay, Ryu,” he said softly, caressing Ryu’s hair. “Because no matter what happens, I love you.” If…when…I come back, I want you to marry me. He wished he could say the words right now. Go to the drawer and take out the ring. But he couldn’t. Not until this trial was over.

  Ryu gazed up at him, one hand on Nat’s cheek. “I love you too.”

  Nat lay on top of him as long as he dared, but time was moving forward, uncaring of their sadness, and so he finally levered himself up, took a quick shower and got dressed before packing his things.

  “I want to go to the airport with you.”

  Nat pulled a small pile of t-shirts from the drawer. They were all he had here in Tokyo. Didn’t need much in the way of clothing except to go to the gym. Here at the White Tiger, he and Ryu spent most of their time either naked or in kimonos to go to and from the baths downstairs. His bag sat open next to Ryu on the bed. He pushed the shirts into the bag and paused. “What about Mr. Hamura? This is his night to come for a massage.”

  “I’ll call him and postpone for tomorrow. He’s a dear friend. He’ll understand.”

  Nat sighed. It was the least he could do, allow Ryu to accompany him in the cab to the airport. Only Buddha knew how long they’d be apart. “Okay. As long as Mr. Hamura doesn’t mind.”

  He knew Ryu would have objected normally, but Mr. Hamura was old and frail and Ryu worried about him much of the time.

  “Ryu-chan.” Naoto’s voice came form the other side of the soji door.

  “Yes?” Ryu got up and slid the door open, revealing the taller, brawny man, hair hanging down past the middle of his back. Next to Kiku, Naoto and Naoto’s lover Koji were Ryu’s most trusted friends here.

  Naoto’s wide rugged face showed the same kind of worry that Kiku’s had earlier. He nodded a polite greeting to Nat before turning back to Ryu. “I’m so sorry to bother you at a time like this,” he said, “but Hamura-san’s housekeeper just called here. Hamura-san won’t be able to keep his appointment tonight.”

  Ryu’s face paled and Nat’s heart lurched. As if things weren’t bad enough. “What’s the matter with him?”

  Naoto shook his head. “They’re not sure. He’s just unwell.”

  “Dammit. I knew something would happen. He’s been going through conflict in his family. The stress has been hurting him.” Ryu raked a hand through his hair. His troubled gaze met Nat’s. “Well, now I can at least go to the airport with you.” Then, to Naoto, “Thank you for telling me. Did he mention whether he would be able to receive visitors?”

  “Actually, yes. He said if you would be so kind, he would send his car. Just to call when you’re ready.”

  Ryu nodded. “I’ll go. On my way back from the airport.”

  Naoto hesitated in the doorway. “Do either of you need anything?” His sympathetic tone was clear. The men of the White Tiger were accustomed to emergency calls taking them away. Their friend Quan Chan was still back in Shanghai, mourning the death of the man who’d raised him.

  “No, thank you, Naoto,” Nat said.

  Naoto sighed. He reached out and affectionately squeezed Ryu’s arm. “Let me know if you do.”

  “Thanks, Nao-chan.” Ryu came back to the bed and perched on the edge. Nat stuffed his shaving kit and spare pair of jeans and a few boxer shorts into the bag. It was mostly for show, really, for Ryu’s sake. Being court-martialled, he was going to be given his uniform for the next few days, as well as a place to stay. He’d rented out his apartment in Bangkok anyway and would have had to stay with Agent Chuek.

  He zipped the gym bag closed and looked at Ryu. There was just enough time for their evening meditation and supper together with the others before they had to catch the taxi. He sank down next to Ryu and pulled Ryu close, resting his cheek on the other man’s hair. Ryu’s deep sigh pushed against him and Nat could feel his lover’s troubled acceptance of their circumstances. “I’ll miss you, Ryu,” he said against Ryu’s hair.

  Ryu clutched Nat’s thigh over his jeans. “Just keep your promise, Nat.” He tilted his face upward and pressed a soft kiss to Nat’s lips. Nat cupped Ryu’s cheek in his palm and lingered over the kiss, his eyes closed. Never before in his life had he savoured a kiss, felt it was a passageway through which his soul and another’s could find each other. With Ryu, every kiss was like that, whether they were gulping hungrily at each other’s mouths, tongues entwined, or brushing their lips together tenderly as they were doing now.

  When the kiss ended, Ryu pulled back, only a couple of inches, close enough that his warm breath still whispered over Nat’s lips. “Keep your promise,” he whispered again.

  Nat rested his forehead against Ryu’s and closed his eyes again. “I will,” he said and laced his fingers with Ryu’s. “I will.”

  Even though in reality, he didn’t know if it was a promise he could keep.

  Chapter Four

  In all the time Ryu had known Hamura-san, he’d never been to the elderly man’s home. He knew it was in Yoyogi, a mostly residential neighbourhood only a kilometre from Shinjuku, the district he lived in. But now, pulling onto the quiet side street of large, bare concrete style mansions, he saw Hamura-san lived only a few streets from his parents’ home, a place Ryu had barely set foot in since Taro Suzuki raped him in his bed there a little more than ten years earlier.

  Ryu hadn’t seen his parents since he’d come back from Thailand and he’d only spoken on the phone to his father once, to thank him for sending money to Kiku, the amount that Taro Suzuki had been extorting from him in exchange for the ills he perceived Kiku had inflicted upon him—one of those ills, having kept Ryu away from him for years.

  Truthfully, he was afraid of his parents. There was the chance his mother had seen Suzuki and his goon going into Ryu’s bedroom that night to rape him, or if she hadn’t seen it, then she’d not protected him and left him vulnerable while his father was out of town. Ryu sighed. He wasn’t proud of fearing his mother and father. Kiku said it was understandable, and even though his father had shown some opening in his horror over what Suzuki had done, Ryu still felt afraid. He’d thought many times with Nat at his side, he’d be able to face his parents. Nat had been training him and when he won more fights and felt he stood on his own feet more, he’d go to his parents. Now, with Nat back in Thailand, he felt as if he’d slid backwards to the beginning.


  The black Mercedes sedan that had picked Ryu up at the White Tiger upon his return from the airport, parked in a small carport built into the ground floor of the house. Hamura-san’s driver got out and opened Ryu’s door, bowing as Ryu climbed out of the back seat.

  Ryu thanked him and followed the uniformed driver to the lower entrance under the front stairwell. He found himself in a front entry hall, its traditional Japanese décor belied by the ultra-modern exterior. Dark polished wood floors, soji screens and low futons arranged around equally low tables completed the rooms he could see. Hamura-san, like Kiku, had impeccable taste, a trait which had probably helped him from his rise as an errand boy to occupying American soldiers in the aftermath of the Second World War to a wealthy businessman in the decades which followed.

  The housekeeper greeted him with a bow as he slipped off his shoes and followed her up two flights of stairs to the master bedroom. The house was dark in the evening hours, lit only by a few soft lamps here and there throughout the house. Somehow, the atmosphere intensified the ache in his chest that had been with him since Nat’s phone call and sudden, harrowing departure.

  A television set played softly behind the soji door that led to the elderly man’s bedroom. The housekeeper announced their presence, at which, the TV shut off and she slid open the door.

  The bedroom was large, covering most of the upper floor of the house, and was as tastefully and traditionally appointed as the downstairs. Hamura-san lay in a wide, low bed, the covers up to his chest. Ryu winced inwardly at the pale, fragile figure so small in the centre of his low king-sized bed. Hamura-san’s face lit with a smile. “Ryu-kun, you came. I’m so glad.” One hand came out and gestured for him to approach.

  Ryu crossed over to the bed and knelt down. Reaching out, he clasped Hamura-san’s thin hand between his. “Of course I came. I was so worried when I got your message.”