In the Giant's Shadow

Mark went to the Frenchmen's Cove resort. He had no plan other than somehow to run into Seljik "accidentally"—to at least establish with the man that Mark was here and available for anything the master wanted.

All that Mark established was the reason for the tension between Philip and Terrence. Seljik and Terrence had taken an after-dinner swim at the resort pool. Mark saw them, kissing as they sat, facing each other, on side-by-side lounge beds by the pool before rising and walking together to the bank of elevators.

So, Philip wasn't staying in the same hotel room Jemal was because Terrence was being bedded by the Turk now. Dejected, Mark decided to walk the two miles back to the resort construction site on a path along the Magens Bay shoreline. On the outskirts of Charlotte Amalie along a somewhat seedy-looking dock area, he stopped in a dive named Almondo's, which turned out to be a gay bar, and sucked on a beer bottle at the bar while watching young men, natives of St. Thomas—most of them black—dancing to noise from scratchy records.

A couple of them were white, though, including a good-looking gray-haired guy who had chiseled features who looked younger than his gray hair suggested. He, was expensively dressed and was obviously putting the make on the young mixed-breed guy sitting at his table, but who also was giving Mark the eye from across the room.

Almondo himself, a big, strapping black in his forties, with a wide grin and no end of advice to everyone at the bar, was helping to attend bar.

An hour later, Mark was lying on his back on a bed in a room behind the bar, panting hard, moaning, and striving to keep his legs spread and raised, as Almondo crouched over him for a second time, all glistening ebony muscle and gleaming white teeth, and grinned down into the young man's face. Mark clutched the black bull's bulbous buttocks in his hands, as the black giant pumped him hard and deep with a thick, long, black cock and Mark went higher and higher into the world of orgiastic pleasure. In exchange, Mark's bar bill was being wiped out whenever he came to the bar for the remainder of his time in the Virgin Islands—with the assumption that Almondo had free access to his ass during this time too.

It was exactly what Mark needed at that moment—an hour of getting it from a big-cocked man when he couldn't be getting it from Jemal Seljik. Of course, all of the time Almondo was pumping him, Mark could pretend that it was the Turk who was on top of and inside him. Almondo had a technique for the first fuck that took Mark's breath away. They lay stretched out beside each other on the man's bed, Mark on his back and Almondo on his side, close into Mark, hovering over Mark, his torso propped up on one elbow, while his other hand moved over Mark's body, slowly caressing me while he murmured endearments on how nice Mark's body was. He worked the hand down to Mark's thighs, running it between the thighs, coaxing Mark to spread his legs and then to bend them and raise his tailbone, levering off his feet, while Almondo slowly worked his hand under Mark's balls, to his hole, and finger fucked him, until the young man was rocking on the fingers and begging for the cock. Then, in one swift move, Almondo was rolling on top of Mark, thrusting up inside him, with Mark open and prepared enough to take the deep thrust with a gasp and digging his fingernails into the black man's bulging biceps, and fucking him hard and fast as Mark writhed and teeth-rattling bucked and moaned and cried out in passion underneath him.

* * * *

Late the next afternoon Mark came to his drafting table fairly humming. He'd been laid, and laid quite proficiently. It hadn't been Seljik, granted, but Almondo had done a really good job on pinning him to the bed. His good mood only added to his confusion, though, when Jemal Seljik showed up at his desk, all smiles and conversation as if they'd talked earlier that day—and, added to that, had with him the handsome gray-haired man Mark had seen in Almondo's the previous night.

"There you are, Mark," Seljik said. "I'd heard you'd arrived and already were at work. I'm sorry I've been too busy to talk with you before. I'm glad we were able to get you to come down to help us out. I'd told Philip that you were just who we needed and to get you down here. I remember how you'd been willing to work under me on Christmas Eve when everyone else had deserted me."

Mark nearly dropped his jaw. That stream of statements was so full of surprises that he hardly knew what to say: Seljik acting like he'd been looking for him when it seemed to Mark that Seljik had been avoiding him; that Seljik was saying it was his idea to hire Mark when Philip claimed that the decision had been Philip's; that Seljik would refer to Christmas Eve night and in terms that Mark would know that Seljik had fucked him that night.

He was still formulating how to respond when the Turkish architect steamed right on to the other surprise Mark was being hit with.

"This is Chaz Winston, Mark," Seljik said, gesturing to the handsome gray-haired guy at his side, who was smiling—maybe a bit knowingly and with familiarity—at Mark. "He's the founder of the WorldTalk Internet social media network. He wants to build a house down here in the mountains overlooking the bay and is interested in me designing the house for him. If he hires us, you no doubt will be doing the drafting."

"Mark, is it?" Winston said, taking Mark's hand in his and flashing him a gorgeous smile. "And are you an architect too, Mark?"

"I'm a graduate student in architecture—at MIT," Mark said shyly, barely able to look into the man's face. Everything about him was gorgeous. He was a regular Paul Newman type.

"Any of these designs yours?" Winston asked. He picked up a scrolled design that was on Mark's desk and opened it up. "This one's interesting."

"That's just an assignment I'm doing for one of my courses and have to send it back."

"Is this vegetation on the roof?"

"Yes. The assignment is for an earth house—set into a ridge line."

"Very nice. Perhaps we'll be working together. I'm an admirer of the signature pavilion-style homes of the Seljik designs. But the concept of earthy houses intrigues me as well."

"Come back to my office and we'll talk about your ideas of what you want in a house," Seljik said, ushering Winston out of the trailer. As they were leaving, though, Seljik turned and said, "Would you be free for dinner tonight, Mark? We could eat at my hotel. I'm at Frenchmen's Cove."

"Yes, I'd like that," Mark answered in what was barely a squeak. It was the first time he'd had a chance to say anything to the architect he worshipped since he arrived in the Virgin Islands.

* * * *

Seljik pushed Mark down on all fours on the carpet of his hotel room just inside the door, jerked Mark's trousers and briefs down to his knees, stripped off his own trousers, mounted Mark's ass, and fucked him right there. Before finishing him, Seljik pulled the young man up, stripped him and himself down, and hustled him over to the sliding glass door out onto his balcony. Mark leaned against the glass, palms on the door, butt jutted back, and legs in a wide stance as the Turk took a time out to kneel behind him and eat his ass out, pull Mark's cock between his legs and stroke it, and finger his ass. Then the Turk stood up, covered the young man from behind, thrust his thick, long cock up into Mark's passage and fucked him some more.

Still, although Mark came, Seljik held off. He swung Mark over onto the bed, on his belly, covered him from above. He held Mark's wrists captive, with the young man's arms over his head, penetrated his channel again, and did pushups on Mark's back, stretched the full length of him and covered him close until, this time, he finally shot his load. He preceded to go to sleep there, stretched out on top of Mark and covering him close.

This would be one night that neither Terrence nor Philip were in Seljik's bed. And, yes, this was the Seljik Mark remembered from Christmas Eve.

The next afternoon, when Mark entered the trailer, expecting either Philip or Terrence to deliver him some work to do overnight, one of the other men brought the list of changes Seljik wanted to have worked into the plans for execution on the main resort building the next day.

"Where are Philip and Terrence?" he asked. "I haven't seen them today."

"Mr. Seljik sent Philip up to Boston for some paperwork and Terrence has gone to his village for a couple of days," the man answered.

So, Mark thought, that's why Jemal suddenly had time for him. His usual pokes weren't here and Mark was. He wouldn't complain, though. He would take the man any way he could get him.

His cellphone rang. He was surprised when he answered it to be talking to the gorgeous Chaz Winston.

"I keep thinking of your earth house design, Mark," Winston said. "I want to take my yacht out late tomorrow morning and I thought you might like to go out with me. I'd like to talk to you about that concept."

"Are you sure that's why you want to take me sailing, Mr. Winston?" Mark asked.

"No, not really. You caught me. I saw you at Almondo's the other night. And I saw that you went in the back with Almondo. Jemal tells me that men fuck you and I did see you at a gay bar. I asked Almondo about you and he tells me you are a sweet lay. Jemal said I could have you if we do business together. I will, of course, let you decide that for yourself. But what I'd like to do is to sail you out into international waters and work your body over good. Am I being too forward? I am honestly interested in your earth house concepts too."

"No, I appreciate your honesty," Mark said.

"Then, would—?"

"Yes," Mark answered. Yes, he resented Seljik giving him to another man, like this. But, yes, going with Chaz Winston was just fine with Mark—and Seljik could jolly well sleep alone tomorrow.

* * * *

He had such a soft mouth and a tantalizing tongue and he knew just when to heighten the need and pleasure and then to back off in time for Mark to recover and to move to the next level of sexual ecstasy before Chaz started working on making him erupt. Chaz was an edger, taken Mark to the edge of ejaculation with his hands or his mouth and then backing off to give Mark time to come off that high only to work him again to take him to a new high, pushing the edge of his endurance higher.

For his part, Mark was trying to hold up his end of the sixty-nine position. They were lying on towels, stretched out in reverse on each other, Chaz on top, in control, on the roof of the cabin of Chaz Winston's yacht hovering beyond the northern coast of St. Thomas Island.

"Oh, shit, I think I can't hold out any longer. I'm going to come," Mark hissed through the lips he'd just pulled off the hunky Chaz's eight incher.

"Suck my balls. Bite the side of my cock. I want to come with you," Chaz commanded.

There was nothing but heavy breathing and deep moans for the next fifteen seconds, and then they both tensed, jerked their bodies in spasms together, and pumped out cum. Chaz took Mark's cum deep in his throat. Mark took Chaz's on his face. Chaz quickly reversed on Mark's body, taking the younger man in his arms and, after licking his own cum off Mark's face, took his mouth in a deep kiss. Holding him close, Chaz's hand went under Mark's balls and he penetrated the younger man's channel with a finger and worked Mark's prostate until Mark gave him a secondary ejaculation.

That was one of Mark's quirks—the capability to have a second orgasm quickly, although more weakly, albeit with a higher-level orgasm. The second one didn't produce as much cum as the first but it took Mark to a higher level of everything else connected with an orgasm than the first one. The first one was a release of cum; the second, a rolling series of orgasms. Jemal knew that; Almondo knew that. There was no reason for Chaz to know that unless one of those two had told him.

Chaz held Mark close, two fingers up his ass, massaging the young man's prostate as, with little yips and jerks, Mark exploded again and again and again. As the eruptions ended, he lay back in Chaz's arms, exhausted and the older man took his lips in a deep kiss. He didn't remove his fingers, though, and holding tight as Mark writhed against him, he worked the prostate to a third series of orgasms.

"How did you know that—?"

"Shush. Don't intrude on the pleasure of coming down off the mountain."

"Coming down from the mountain?"

"Yes. That's what good sex is for me," Winston murmured. "That's why I'm building on top of the mountain here—the mountaintop experience. Building up to it is dancing on the mountaintop. The afterglow is a long glide down off the mountain. That's as important to me as the dance. And it was really good for me this time—I hope for you too. I want to give it to you hard now. I've taken you to the mountaintop. Now it's my turn."

"Oh, god, yes," Mark exclaimed. The blow job had been good—very good—for Chaz, but that's as far as it had gone for him for over an hour out here off the St. Thomas coast. One blow job after the other. And he had such a nice cock, Chaz did. So long. Not overly thick, but long. Mark couldn't wait until he got it inside him.

As if anticipating Mark's anxiousness, Winston gave a low laugh and said, "Not for a while, though. I'm not a young man. We rest first."

They both drifted off, but Mark woke up with Chaz having moved over his body. He already was buried a couple of inches inside the younger man.

"Oh, fuck, yes. Yes!" Mark exclaimed, spreading his legs further, rubbing the heels of his feet on Chaz's bubble butt, and arching his head back and panting as running his fingers down the side of his cock to give it more girth, Chaz entered, entered, entered him and started to pump in earnest. Chaz fluttered his buried fingers between shaft and passage walls to give not only greater stretch but a rubbing feel Mark had never felt before. Mark lay there, gasping and moaning deeply at the expertise with which he was being taken.

Every fiber of Mark's attention focused on that long, long cock working its way up inside him, caressing every inch of his channel as it invaded and then, with the added attention of the buried fingers, started to work him, slowly at first, but then faster, faster, and faster, until Mark was writhing under the older, gorgeous man, his cries of taking echoing across the water, and him dancing now on Chaz's mountaintop—going to the mountaintop again with Chaz.

Chaz laid him good and proper, Mark begged for it again, and Chaz laid him out again. Afterward Mark sprawled there, limbs akimbo, blowing bubbles, and moaning in low tones, as Chaz propped himself up on an elbow and looked down, smiling, into the young man's face.

"You seem to have enjoyed that. I know I did," Chaz murmured.

"I'm such a slut," Mark whimpered.

"Yes, you are. I like you that way, though."

"Is that what all the talk was about concerning wanting to talk to me about my earth house design? Did you just want to get me out here and on my back?"

"That had priority, of course—getting you out here and under me—but, no, I do want to talk to you about your design."

"So, talk," Mark said, sitting up with a groan.

"I don't want to build Seljik's signature open pavilions on the top of the mountain. I want the mountaintop clear for dancing. I want to build one of your earth houses just below the peak, strung out along the ridge. I want it to be invisible from below. I want it to be part of the mountain."

"I work for Jemal Seljik. It will have to be worked through him."

"I don't want to access you through Jemal. I want to possess you fully for myself. You can't get from Seljik what you can get from me. He's just using you when he isn't getting it from others. I want you to come work for—and under—me."

"I don't know," Mark answered.

"I've watched you. I have researched Seljik's operations. With Seljik, it's just him, the great man. Everyone around him is just there to serve him and his genius. Yes, it's genius, but he's not the only one who can think and create. You can live in his shadow as a draftsman, or you can come with me and be an architect—standing in no one's shadow in your creation. My creativity is in other directions altogether. I won't cover you with my shadow. You deserve to stand in the sunlight. Building this house for me will make your reputation. I can get it publicized."

"I'm just a graduate student. Working under Jemal Seljik will make my reputation too—more safely," Mark said.

"Mark my words. Working under Jemal Seljik with burnish his reputation, not yours. But just think about it for now. For now, I want—"

"I can see what you want," Mark said, with a low laugh.

"What I want," Winston said, as he reclined on his back, his long erection pointing to the sky, "is to lie back and for you to ride me."

It was what Mark wanted to do too, so he did.

* * * *

Chest flat on bed, knees digging into the foot of the bed, tail in the air, Mark was concentrating on taking Almondo's thick, long, black dick deep inside. He'd told himself that he'd come to the bar to look for Chaz Winston, not knowing where he was staying and not seeing his yacht in Magens Bay harbor, to tell him that he'd be his architect. But he hadn't found Chaz here, and when he got here, he realized that he wasn't really looking for the man or prepared to give himself to him—either as an employee or a lover. The only thing he could think of all the time he was searching the area for Winston was that he still had so much to learn—that he was lucky to be living in Jemal Seljik's shadow.

When Almondo had tilted his head and smiled, Mark had gone with him willingly. It was the escape he needed from thinking about his options. But was Seljik even an option? The man hadn't made any commitments to him—certainly nothing beyond the current project and even his status in that was uncertain. And he'd quite easily pimped him to Chaz Winston. Who had brought him here? Philip? Jemal? Who was to be believed? When did Jemal call for him? Only when Philip or Terrence wasn't available?

But then Almondo was pumping him hard—and good—and he lost all thought of Jemal and Chaz and architecture, which is exactly what he came to Almondo's to get.

When Mark got back to his trailer office, there was a telephone message from Jemal. He was to appear for dinner with Seljik at the Frenchmen's Cove resort dining room in two hours.

"Chaz Winston tells me he doesn't want to build a Seljik design for his house on the mountain," Seljik said, when they were seated at the table.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Mark said.

"He wants to build a design he saw on your worktable—a house built into the mountain just below the ridge, with vegetation-covered roofing that visually disappears into the mountain scape."

"Yes, I'm sorry. I didn't show it to him. You were standing there when he saw it. He picked the design up from my desk. It's an assignment I'm doing for my MIT courses. He just saw it and asked about it. I didn't work on it on my office time, but certainly, if the firm wants to use that concept for Winston—"

"The firm doesn't want to use any concept but a Seljik concept," Jemal answered, his voice not actually a growl, but the inference was there, just below the surface. His tone became more relaxed then, though. "We won't build that house for Winston, but you could, if you wanted. You could sign up with another firm, or you could start up your own firm with the Winston house. He's worth a fortune in PR as a client."

"I'm still a student," Mark said. "I'm still learning." And that was, in fact, the bottom line. It was only a school assignment that had caught Winston's fancy. Mark wasn't ready to go out on his own yet. And he didn't want to anyway. He wanted to work under Seljik—and what Seljik wanted from him beyond that was also what Mark wanted from the Turkish genius in the world of architecture.