Free Vigil by Z. A. Maxfield

shirtsleeves like a wanton?”
    “Stop making me sound like a gothic novel,” Donte told him.
    Adin located Donte’s belt buckle and undid it without taking
    his eyes from Donte’s. “Don’t knock it. Fully half the reason I
    love you is because of your tailor.”
    Donte’s expression softened. “Still love me?”
    58 Z.A. Maxfield
    Something about the way Donte asked made Adin’s breath
    hitch. “You must know I do.”
    “When you’re next to me, I can feel it.” Donte pulled him
    close. Adin didn’t resist. “I can see it in your eyes and smell it on
    your skin.”
    “Donte.” Adin smiled into Donte’s neck.
    “Then you leave and it’s complicated by time and distance and
    mortality and—”
    “I’m here now,” Adin breathed, pulling his shirt off over his
    head. Donte’s fingers worked the fastenings on Adin’s jeans and
    soon they were naked, skin-to-skin, and tumbling into the narrow
    bed together. “You’re magnificent, Donte.”
    Donte loomed over Adin, who lay on his back against the
    pillows and smiled up at him like he was a god. “No, you are.
    Mio meraviglioso amore. Il mio cuore è per te, caro. Per sempre. ” My heart
    belongs to you for always .
    “ Tu sei la mia vita, Donte, la mia anima.” You are my life, my soul.
    Adin felt his face heat. “Which is ironic really, given that you’re
    undead, but there you have it.” His lips curved in a smile of
    welcome, and Donte hungrily found them with his own.
    Adin drowned in all the things his senses told him. Donte’s
    skin was soft, velvety, and cool beneath his fingertips and where
    it pressed against his own, he smelled like cigars and croissants
    and coffee and tasted of lime and some elusive Middle-Eastern
    spice, cardamom maybe, but savory. Like a cardamom pod and
    the bittersweet peel of oranges.
    “Donte,” Adin whispered, “ lover .”
    Donte lifted Adin’s leg, nudging and bumping him until Adin
    could feel Donte’s cock gliding along in its own slickness over his
    perineum.
    Adin’s eyes closed. “ Oh .”
    “Must I beg?” Donte asked, but Adin could see he was teasing.
    “Must I ask permission to enter, as if I were a vampire standing
    in the doorway of your home?”
    Vigil 59
    Adin felt around over his shoulder and was only a little
    frustrated by the fastening on his case. He pulled out a bottle of
    lube and Donte pursed his lips.
    “If I believed you packed this just for your trip to Paris, I’d
    be concerned.”
    Adin nipped at Donte’s chin while Donte slid a slick finger
    around his puckered entry to prepare him. “I knew eventually
    you would lose interest in even that most exciting of all undead
    pastimes—gazing into the dark by yourself—and come to me.”
    Donte sank into Adin with a sigh they passed between them
    through kisses and the soft sounds of pain and pleasure. For
    Adin, the challenge was always how to get closer to Donte, how
    to be absorbed into Donte’s skin, so he wrapped himself around
    Donte’s body and hung on, lurching into a kiss. Hands grasped
    his ass as Donte’s feet found traction, allowing him to drive into
    Adin again and again.
    After a time, Donte’s strokes were so fast and short and hard
    that Adin could barely breathe around the panting half breaths
    of air forced out of him. He hardly had time to drag air back
    into his lungs while Donte drilled and held him, punished and
    cherished him all at once. His head spun. He wondered how he’d
    ever thought he could live without it – even for a short time.
    “Ah, Donte . ”
    Low, throaty groans signaled Donte was on the edge of
    release, and Adin was with him on the precipice, his heartbeat
    waiting, his nerves thrumming eagerly.
    “ Donte .” The world tilted and slipped and slid away from
    Adin as if Donte were rising into the air with him in his arms,
    taking flight, into perfect, heartbreaking, starry black skies. Adin’s
    cry was both strangled by emotion and smothered by Donte’s
    mouth, which captured