morgan Read online

  Evander seemed to read his mind. Maybe his new understanding showed on his face. “So what are you going to do about your future?” he asked, still idly stroking himself as he watched Morgan pick up his jumpsuit and shake it out. “You said you wanted to join the Guards. I ask you again, why don’t you?”

  “Well, a lot of things,” Morgan confessed, blushing. “Right now I’m kind of committed to my job at the Parallax. The owners trust me, since my whole family works there, and in a few years I can probably get a promotion and make enough to get my own place.”

  “To Hades with that,” Evander said with a gruff laugh. “In the Guards, you could get your own ship. But, of course, it’s up to you. Just a matter of how you want to spend those years.”

  Morgan shrugged miserably. A moment earlier, he’d felt like he could do anything and go anywhere. Now he felt like a dumb, useless kid again. “I want to make my life matter,” he said, immediately feeling foolish afterward. Evander must think he was a total idiot.

  “So do it. Sounds like the only person stopping you from doing that is you.” Evander dropped his cock, folded his hands behind his head, and crossed his ankles. Morgan took that as a signal that their time together was over.

  They didn’t talk much more, nothing too far beyond “thanks for inviting me” and “see you around” as Morgan dressed again and let himself out. As he walked down the same crowded street, he imagined that all the guys gathered there, and maybe some of the women, too, were looking at him differently. He couldn’t tell whether they were admiring or pitying him, but then he realized that he was just trying to sort out his own emotions about everything that had happened that night. By the time he got home and went directly to his room, avoiding his parents, he still hadn’t figured it out.

  Well, there was always tomorrow, he figured glumly as he slid into bed naked. And he’d spent that day, and most likely many days to follow, back at the casino.

  ****

  The following afternoon, some excitement erupted at the casino when a Phirellan tourist, drunk on Quantum ale, assaulted a dealer he accused of cheating him. Along with a number of other uniformed staff members, Morgan paused to watch Parallax security guards wrestle the troublemaker to the ground and haul him off to a detox cell. Morgan was grateful for the excuse to stop working and distract himself for a few minutes. The day had passed slowly and painfully, his thoughts muddled with memories of Evander and how many stupid things Morgan had said and done while they were together. No doubt the Star Guard was having a good laugh with his friends over the clueless portside rat he’d seduced the night before.

  Morgan was so involved in watching the unpleasant scene unfold that he didn’t even notice someone steal up behind him.

  “House always wins,” a low voice rumbled in his left ear. “You’d think they’d figure that out after a while.”

  A thrill coursed all the way from Morgan’s ear down to the base of his spine when he recognized the voice. He turned and saw Evander standing right beside him, back in uniform again, though this time his tunic was buttoned up to the neck. At first, he was too stunned to respond, so he was grateful when Evander spared him the necessity.

  “You must get pretty sick of jackoffs like him interfering with your ability to make a living,” Evander went on without waiting for a reply. “The public doesn’t appreciate anything you guys do around here, do they?” He lifted a drink, identical to the free samples Morgan himself had carried around on a tray for half the day already, and offered a mock toast.

  Once again, Morgan wasn’t really sure what to say, especially since it was true. Evander laughed at his ambiguous expression. “Well, for what it’s worth, I appreciate you. In fact, if it weren’t for you I probably wouldn’t have hung around here so long.”

  “How—how long?” Morgan asked, shocked to think that Evander had been so close the whole time he had been thinking about him. Maybe the Star Guard had even been watching him as he worked. He blushed deeply.

  “A few hours. This is a pretty big place. No matter, I managed to win a few chits.” Evander patted the breast pocket of his uniform. Then he glanced around the gaming room to make sure no one watching and moved his hand toward Morgan’s crotch. Morgan’s face did a slow burn as his fingers roved over the bulge behind the fly of the tan trousers that were part of his casino garb. It seemed like all the blood in his body rushed down to his cock, which pushed up to meet Evander’s kneading fingertips. Morgan’s mouth opened, half in surprise, half in a groan he managed to suppress just in time.

  “Have you heard about the officer’s reception tonight? Some visiting dignitary is throwing it.” Evander asked quietly, pulling his hand back at the exact moment Morgan’s father, wearing the slightly more ornate outfit of a floor supervisor, appeared in the doorway of the room. No doubt he had come to investigate the melee with the tourist, but his steely gaze went directly to Morgan and Evander. “It’s in the private function room on the eighth level. Make sure you’re there, too.”

  “I will be,” Morgan gulped, feeling hot trickles of sweat leak down into his collar—not to mention down the crack of his ass. “I can easily arrange to be on duty for that. Just a matter of volunteering for overtime.”

  “Great.” Evander winked, then turned back and walked into the crowd as if nothing had happened. Unfortunately, there was no way Morgan could hide the throbbing erection he’d popped, so he avoided his father and hurried away. Out of the corner of his eye, Morgan saw Evander flash him a suggestive smile before he casually sauntered over to the gaming tables.

  Ducking into a small area used to store cleaning supplies, Morgan leaned against the wall and exhaled deeply. He didn’t dare to openly jack off right there, where anyone could walk in and see him. Instead, he covered his fly with his palm and tried to squeeze away the pressure in his aching hard-on and blazing nuts. He was only partially successful, so it was quite a chore to go back out to the floor and finish his work for the day. Somehow, though, he got through it—mostly because he was already looking forward to serving at the private function. A little voice in his head—or maybe it was coming from his cock—told Morgan that afterward, his dull life would never be the same.

  Morgan reported for duty 15 minutes early that evening, decked out in crisp white pants and a tunic decorated with the Parallax emblem. Underneath, he had on a brand-new pair of sparkling white briefs that cupped his cock and balls like a warm, massaging hand. With any luck, he thought, that was just a prelude of the good things to come.

  He had some trouble staying focused on his duties that evening, especially when he saw how sharp Evander looked walking into the party wearing the same dress uniform Morgan had seen hanging in his closet. He sauntered in with a group of his buddies, also in uniform, which made Morgan nervous for a minute. He quickly ditched them, though, and motioned for Morgan to follow him. Morgan slipped through the crowd at a discreet distance, his mind racing with visions of him out of that uniform, his naked hips lunging toward Morgan’s wide-open mouth....

  Suddenly, he turned the corner by the buffet table and headed into an adjoining room. For a moment, Morgan lost sight of him. He had just started to panic when a hand darted from behind a door—one that was supposed to be locked—and pulled him inside. Morgan found himself with Evander in a storage room, filled with furniture that had been moved aside for the reception. Tables and chairs ranged along the walls, carefully stacked and covered with sheets.

  “Welcome to my private party,” Evander said, grinning as he dangled one of the function area’s remote controls in front of his face. Morgan had no idea where he’d gotten it, but he guessed Evander was used to getting what he wanted.

  Like Morgan himself, for example.

  Evander typed in a code on the remote to lock the door so they wouldn’t be disturbed. Then he stepped in front of Morgan, pulled up the hem of his tunic, and unfastened his fly.

  He stared down at Morgan’s cock for a long time, his eyes widening as fast as Morgan’s
cock did. While it rose to attention between them, Morgan stared, fascinated, at his own throbbing veins and tiny hairs that stood out against his pale, almost transparent skin. Evander gazed for an equally long moment at Morgan’s swollen balls and the red-tipped erection that rose from a patch of curly black hair. He licked his lips as if he were settling in front of a large, long-anticipated meal. Then he hunkered down and went directly to work.

  Without a single unnecessary movement, Evander slid his head forward and molded his lips around Morgan’s blood-filled shaft. Up and down his tongue slithered, passing over the pointed tip of Morgan’s cock and poking briefly into the tiny slit, and finally moving along the flaring center vein in his shaft. Morgan reached forward and slid his palms over Evander’s scruffy hair, pushing him down harder on his cock. Evander made a little croaking sound when Morgan filled his whole throat with hot flesh, but like the expert he seemed to be, Evander flexed his muscles and managed to gulp a little more of Morgan down.

  Grunting with every pleasure-filled stroke, Morgan started a slow plunging motion in and out of Evander’s face. At that point, Morgan allowed himself to relax and take in the excitement of what was happening. Having another man suck his cock was way more amazing than Morgan could even imagined. Why had he waited so long to try it?

  It got even better when his hips suddenly spasmed in climax. Evander’s tongue went flat as Morgan let loose. His orgasm was so intense Morgan felt like he blacked out for a minute. He stopped breathing again, just like he had when he’d been doing to sucking, while he drained his nuts into Evander’s pulsating gullet.

  “Unnghh, yeah,” he was growling. His eyes closed, his body shaking all over, Morgan stumbled backward until he was leaning against a stack of dining-room chairs. Evander stayed with him, crawling along without ever detaching his mouth. Finally, unable to carry on a moment longer and feeling like he was about to collapse, Morgan moved his hands to Evander’s shoulders forehead and pushed him off his wilting cock.

  They rested for a moment, both of them seated on the floor. Morgan reluctantly pulled up his pants. Evander seemed to glow in his perfectly tailored silver-and-white dress uniform. But then, the man was magic in every sense of the word.

  “Wow,” Morgan said when he recovered his composure. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt anything that intense.”

  “I wanted to repay you for what you did for me last night,” Evander said, drawing his legs up and resting his elbows on them. “Letting me be your first…that’s an honor I’ll never forget.”

  “You know a lot about honor, I guess. I mean, you’re a Star Guard,” Morgan said, his eyes growing misty with that familiar hero-worship again, the kind he’d always felt whenever he saw a Star Guard stride past him on the street or in the casino. But all of those emotions seemed to grow exponentially when he directed them at Evander specifically.

  “Sure I am. But I’m one of many. And there’s room for plenty more. Trust me, Morgan, you have as good a shot as anyone at becoming one yourself. I’m shipping back out tomorrow, so we probably won’t see each other here again after tonight. But I hope someday I’ll see you out there somewhere.” He tilted his head, looking up at the ceiling, and pretended to search the skies. “We’d better get back to the party before someone misses us,” he finally said.

  “Yeah. You’re right.” Morgan wiped himself off, zippered up, and smoothed down the front of his tunic while Evander did the same. Then they went back out and rejoined the event, a Star Guard and a hired casino hand no one would ever look twice at. No one did—except Evander. More than once, Morgan looked up from collecting a used plate from one of the officer guests, or handing a drink to one of the ladies present, to find Evander Redshift smiling directly at him. Once, he even lifted a glass of Ajdu wine in a mock toast so discreetly performed that Morgan doubted anyone else even noticed. Then, just before the party ended, Evander Redshift stepped into the crowd and disappeared from view. Morgan didn’t see him again.

  That night, Morgan made his way home with a fresh swagger in his step and a new resolve in his attitude that didn’t fade. The next time a recruitment contingent for the Star Guards came around to their quadrant, Morgan enlisted. His parents argued with him, as he’d known they would, and lectured him about family tradition and knowing and accepting one’s station in life.

  “But that’s the point,” Morgan had finally told them, spreading his hands as if trying to reach out and grab the life he envisioned in front of him. “This is my station, my place, my future. I’ve known that for nearly as long as I’ve been alive.”

  Luckily, in the end, they’d understood. The night the shuttle took off with him and his fellow recruits, they’d waved to him until the doors closed with a hiss and auto-latched for takeoff.

  The guy in the seat beside him was about his age, with a friendly expression.

  “I’m Dustin,” he said as they shook hands. “You’re from Earth?”

  “Genetically, I’m Terran,” Morgan informed him. “Never actually been there, though. You?”

  “Los Angeles.” Dustin sighed. “Time to get off that rock. Came all the way out here to catch up with the recruiters. Missed them when they passed through my corner of the planet.” His lips lifted in the kind of wistful smile Morgan knew all too well. “I’ve dreamed all my life about being a Star Guard.”

  “Me too.”

  Morgan opened the window flap and gazed out at the endless plane of black space, studded with diamond-bright stars. Evander was out there somewhere.

  He couldn’t wait to catch up and prove that he’d made it after all.

  About the Author

  Jade Astor is a longtime fan of both m/m and f/f erotic love stories, and got her start writing paranormal and sci-fi fan fiction back when such publications were still run off on photocopiers, stapled together, and shipped out to other fans in manila envelopes. Years later, she was delighted to find a thriving population of like-minded writers and readers in the ebook community. When she is not writing, Jade enjoys sculpting, tinkering with computers, and training (and retraining) her small herd of unruly but adorable rescued Chihuahuas.

  Dark Hollows Press

  Dark Hollows Press is a publisher of erotic romance. We publish all genres of erotic expression, including, m/m, f/f, m/f and ménage. We believe our authors are artists and their talent shouldn't be censored, so our authors present high quality stories full of romance, desire and sometimes graphic moments that are both entertaining and erotic. We have an exclusive group of talented writers and we publish stories that range from historical to fantasy, sci-fi to contemporary.

  We invite you to visit us at www.darkhollowspress.com.