Some nights, American secret agent Ben Smith just wants to come home to his husband. He misses that English accent and smile and, of course, Simon on his knees. He wants his perfect submissive at his feet, so the world and his mission can fall away.<br><br>Some nights, romance writer Simon Ashley misses his dashing American other half. Tea is nice, but it can’t pin him down in bed and make him beg, reminding him he’s loved and belongs to someone. He wants to forget everything and everyone he’s left behind, and just belong to Ben.<br><br>Tonight they both get what they want when Ben comes home early. tea is very nice ... but so is leather.

Leather and Tea

“And it went fine. Simple message pickup. I went, I picked up, I delivered, I came home.”


He added sugar, precisely measured. Then milk, just a splash. Then came back over and sat down and held out both hands. Simon took them, and Ben wrapped fingers around those long graceful ones, relearning, reassuring, sliding down to grip fine-boned wrists and squeezing: we’re here, I’m here, this is true.


Simon breathed in, looking at those broad hands, firm over the leather cuffs. The contrast was startling as ever: tanned skin, scarred with old mementos and memories and a once-broken finger, versus gilt-leaf English-rose coloring. Ben rubbed a thumb over the knot of one offered wrist bone, thoughtfully. He’d be willing to bet rather a lot of money on his husband being the stronger one of the two of them.


He’d fallen in love in an airport. He’d say so, and had said so before, if asked. Truthfully, he’d fallen in love long before that. He just hadn’t known it.


Chapter 2