Gabriel and the Devil Read online

  “But you can?”

  “Sometimes I think that I can. I think you can too. Aren’t there times when you feel compelled to contact someone only to hear that they were just thinking about you?”

  It happened. “But that’s just a coincidence.”

  “Maybe. Anyway, the other side is where our souls go to rest between lives—to rejuvenate and get ready for the next life.”

  “Next life? Reincarnation?”

  “It’s the only thing that makes sense. We come here to learn life’s lessons, to make a journey. We move to a higher spiritual plane if we learn everything we’re supposed to learn. If we don’t learn our lessons we have to come back and try again, only the lesson gets harder.”

  “So that’s what’s happening to me now? I didn’t learn my lesson before so it’s getting harder. You’re here to ensure that it’s harder?”

  “I’m here to help you. I’m here to make the lesson as easy as possible for you—if you’ll let me.”

  He stopped walking. I hadn’t paid any attention to where we were going, but we were right outside the apartment building door. Marcello reached his hand out to me.

  “It looks like fate has led us back here. C’mon up. I promise that we won’t do anything you don’t want to do. We really just need to talk.”

  He took my hand, and he led me up the stairs.

  HE OFFERED me apple juice and promised it wasn’t really beer. While he prepared our drinks, I looked around at the pictures. The photos of the woman who lived here before still stood on the sideboard. Next to her were photos of a chubby little boy at various ages. A few were with the woman.

  When Marcello returned I asked, “Who’s the little boy?”

  “Oh him? That’s her son.”

  “If she’s gone now, where is he?”

  “He’s grown and doing fine.”

  “How can that be? He just lost his mother!”

  Marcello came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me.

  “Trust me, Gabriel. He’s doing fine. He grew out of the baby fat and became quite handsome. When he was young, he was Mr. Invisible. Nobody ever noticed him, except to pick on him. But he grew into a handsome man. Sure, he misses his mother, but he knows that she’s safe on the other side. She’s completed her journey and taught him all she can. He’s content with his life. They’re soul mates and when it’s time, he’ll join her again. Maybe they’ll even share another lifetime together?”

  “Soul mates? That sounds kinda incestuous.”

  He was shaking his head, and his beard scratched the back of my neck.

  “Soul mates aren’t just lovers. On the other side, equally evolved souls are in soul groups. Sometimes, here on Earth, they connect to guide each other or just lend comfort. They love each other but not necessarily romantically. It’s like a parent’s love for a child or the love shared between friends. When two souls are really lucky, they find a soul mate for romantic love.”

  He gave me as squeeze. His soft baritone was soothing to listen to, and his story sounded so sincere I couldn’t help but believe it was true.

  “And what about the boy and his life here? Will he find love now that he’s on his own, or is he destined to stay alone?”

  “I think he’s found love, only it takes two to make a relationship. Both souls have the freedom to choose their own destinies and take their own journeys. Hopefully his love will choose him too.”

  I turned in Marcello’s arms.

  “I really want to believe you—the devil who only speaks of love. I just wish I could be as sure as you are.”

  He smiled at me and kissed me on the nose.

  “That’s what faith is. Faith is believing in something that you can’t prove. I have faith in you. I have faith that you will one day let go of all the strict rules that have walled you in and rely on your own feelings for what is right or wrong. Only Gabriel can know what’s right for Gabriel.”

  He kissed my nose again before moving down to plant a soft kiss on my lips. My eyes instinctively closed. I wanted to memorize the moment. This was right for me. Maybe I couldn’t go to hell for this. Maybe I’d only go to the other side. But—

  “Where will you go?” I asked.

  He pulled his face away from me to study my eyes.

  “When?”

  “When this is over. Whatever kind of existence a devil lives. If I go to the other side when I die, will you be there?”

  “Yes.”

  “And here. How long will you be here? Will you only stay long enough to take my eternal soul and then move on and leave me alone?”

  “When you’re ready to give me your eternal soul, I’ll be ready to stay with you forever—both here and on the other side. What’s eternal if it’s not forever?”

  I wrapped my arms tightly around him and laid my head on his shoulder.

  “I want this to last forever. What do I have to do?”

  He squeezed me back and planted a gentle kiss behind my ear.

  “You’ve already taken the first step.”

  Chapter Five

  I GAVE in to temptation. I freely gave my eternal soul to the devil.

  Marcello led me by the hand to the bedroom. I hadn’t paid much attention to the room the first time I was in here. But this time I noticed that the room had been the boy’s room. The posters on the walls were of boy bands from a decade ago. A guitar stood in one corner. There was a windowpane-patterned bedspread on the queen-size bed, and the maple furniture was decidedly masculine although quite old.

  Marcello led me straight to the bed. There was a footboard, so we sat on the side that faced the window to the street below. I was shivering.

  “Relax, Angel. You’re nervous.” Marcello put his arm around my shoulder and pulled me in tight. “We’re not going to do anything that you aren’t completely comfortable doing. Okay?”

  I could barely nod. My shivering had gotten so bad, and I could feel sweat pouring from my underarms. I’d never be able to take off my shirt.

  His mouth was close to my ear as he whispered, “Maybe we can just start where we left off, okay?” Then he licked my earlobe.

  I turned my head and our lips met. It was soft and tender, and I instinctively reached my arm across his chest to pull him in tighter. After a few tender kisses, we both became a bit hungrier and the kissing became more urgent. I had to stop it. I pushed him away.

  “Wait,” I gasped. “We have to make some rules.”

  He gave me his devilish grin.

  “Rules? What sort of rules did you have in mind?”

  I tried to look serious as I pointed to the little red mark still on my neck.

  “No biting. This thing got me in a lot of trouble.”

  He laughed. “Okay. Sorry, I got a little possessive and I wanted to mark my territory. I’ll try to control myself.”

  I rubbed my hand on his tightly trimmed goatee.

  “And this thing gave me whisker burn. I don’t know how we get around that.”

  “It seems to have cleared up,” he pointed out as he ran his hand over my cheek. “Did you do anything for it?”

  “I’ve been putting body lotion on it. That seems to help.”

  “Did it sting?”

  “No. It made it feel better.”

  “Good. Then whatever you’re using doesn’t have too high of an SPF. Your face feels soft too. Moisturizing really helps. But I’ll try to be gentle—well, as gentle as I can be.”

  We started kissing again, and soon I was the guy running my tongue across his lips, begging for entry. He was quick to comply. Our arms tightened around each other, and I couldn’t keep sitting up on the bed. I fell back, pulling him on top of me. His weight on my body felt so good. I liked it before when I’d lain on top of him. But this was different and good too. My kisses became fiercer and more urgent.

  He pulled back and put his hand over my mouth.

  “Slow down, Angel. I promised I’d be gentler. You’re going to have to be gentler too.”
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  I opened my mouth and sucked in his fingers.

  Breathlessly I said, “I don’t want to be gentler. Whisker burn be damned.” That’s when I realized I wasn’t shivering or sweating anymore.

  He laughed and dove back in. We rolled around on the bed kissing like that for what seemed like hours. Our hands were all over each other, and we were both thrusting our pelvises, feeling the hardness through our trousers. I couldn’t take it anymore. I rolled him to his back and broke off the kiss long enough to start unbuttoning his shirt.

  “Are you sure—?”

  I didn’t let him finish the thought. Two buttons were undone. That was enough for me to reach in and go back to kissing him so he’d be quiet. He moaned into my mouth as I ran my hand over his firm hairy chest. When I found a nipple, it was hard. I wanted to see it, so I broke the kiss again and fumbled with more buttons. Marcello got the one I’d missed, or else it would have been torn off as I splayed his shirt wide and gazed at his sculpted olive-skinned chest. In a moment, my mouth was on his nipple. I licked it and let my tongue run circles around before giving it a little nip. I know I was the one who’d said no biting, but I couldn’t resist.

  Marcello didn’t protest. He just moaned.

  I went back to kissing him, but it wasn’t right. I didn’t like the feeling of my shirt in the way. I wanted us to be skin to skin. I sat up, straddling his hips, and quickly began to unbutton my own dress shirt while Marcello ran his hands across every patch of exposed skin he could reach as soon as I revealed it. I tossed the shirt behind me, not caring where it landed. His hands felt incredible, but when I plunged back to kiss him again and our chests rubbed against each other, it was electric. The hair on his chest tickled me, and I reached around his back to pull us closer together.

  Marcello reached around my back too with his arms still entangled in his shirt. He rolled us back over until he was on top, and then he broke the kissing long enough to shuck his shirt completely. Just as he started to dive back in, I put my hands up to stop him. The look of disappointment that crossed his face was so endearing.

  I laughed. “Don’t worry. I want to keep going. I just need a moment to look at you.” With my hands still on his chest, I began to explore. He placed a hand on each side of me with his arms locked straight as he held back, letting me enjoy the moment. My fingers explored every crevice in his washboard abs. My palms ran over his tight triceps while my thumbs brushed against his biceps. All the while Marcello smiled down on me, accepting my worship with loving eyes.

  “I wanted to do this to you the first night we met,” I admitted. “When I saw you in your uniform, I could barely take my eyes off your chest.” Then I reached my hands up to his neck and gave a gentle pull. “I never dreamed I’d really be doing this.” His arms buckled and our lips came crashing into each other.

  While we kissed, I heard two distinctive thumps. He’d kicked off his loafers. I took the hint and did the same. As much as I was enjoying being skin to skin, every time he shifted the wrong way his belt buckle ground into my stomach. I rolled him over so I was back on top and pulled away from his lips. Grasping his belt, I said, “This has to go,” and I quickly unfastened it.

  But once his belt was open, Marcello wouldn’t move and his weight held the back of the belt in place. I couldn’t free it from its loops. Again, he gave me his devilish grin.

  “Yours too—and the pants. You can keep your underwear on.”

  It was my turn to try out my devilish grin, and I cocked an eyebrow.

  “How do you know I’m wearing any?”

  “Because a good altar boy would never go commando in church.”

  I slapped his stomach before jumping up to strip off my pants. Of course, I was wearing underwear—white boxer briefs. And so was he, but his were black. Still, we both had a big wet spot at the end of a long hard lump.

  When I came back to the bed he’d changed positions, his head lain upon his pillow. His arms were outstretched to me.

  “Come to me, Angel.”

  I crawled across the bed and fell into his arms. We went back to kissing and rolling around. The sensation of his skin touching mine all over was intoxicating. I couldn’t get enough of it as I rubbed my legs against his. My chest was tight up against him, and my arms encircled his back. With our lips locked together, we continued to thrust our pelvises against each other, and I was so hard and wet with precum that I was afraid I was going to explode any second.

  Marcello had to have been as close while he struggled to disentangle me from him.

  He gasped, “Wait a second. Let me catch my breath.”

  I flopped to his side, a bit disappointed that he’d stopped us.

  He turned his head toward me. “I told you that we wouldn’t do anything you’re not completely comfortable with. If you want to get off doing the Princeton Rub, that works for me.”

  “The what?”

  He chuckled. “The Princeton Rub. It’s basically when a couple of horny schoolboys wrestle around together fully clothed until they both cum. The schoolboys would never admit what they’d done, but they’d usually do it again. Anyway, somebody gave it a name: the Princeton Rub.”

  I couldn’t look at him. I stared up into the ceiling as I spoke. “Of course you know all of this stuff. I don’t have any idea of what I’m doing here.”

  His deep voice was gentle and sweet. “Sure you do, Angel. In fact, you’re a natural.” He stroked my cheek. “You just dove in ready to try whatever felt right. You’re doing great.”

  I was a bit sullen. “It was just kissing.”

  His hand slid slowly down my chin, and his fingers tickled across my smooth bare chest until one fingernail lightly grazed my nipple, making it hard.

  “Right. This is just kissing—with most of our clothes off.”

  “That wasn’t my….” I was going to say it wasn’t my idea until I remembered that nearly every bit of clothing removal was instigated by me.

  His fingertip ran on down until it reached my navel.

  “We’re in this position because this is where you led us.” Then his finger continued south until it was running along the hard ridge in my boxer briefs. “I have an idea that you know exactly what you’d like to do next.”

  My voice came out stuttered low and growlingly from his touch, “I-I d-don’t know how? H-how do you decide who’s gonna… um… well….”

  He laughed before he kissed me.

  “The first thing that we decide is that: you are nowhere near ready for that if you don’t know what you want to do. There are so many other things we can do first. Things that don’t take a lot of preparation.”

  “You mean like—” My voice dropped to a whisper. “—sucking?”

  He brought his mouth right next to my ear and whispered, “Yes. But if you’re not ready to say blowjob out loud, you’re not ready for that either.” He pulled his head away, and he slowly moved his palm along my cotton-covered length. “I’m pretty sure even altar boys know how to jerk off, and by the time they’re fourteen they figure out the priest jerks off too, so there’s no reason to confess it.”

  Okay, I hadn’t figured that out yet. It was still a sin that I confessed to. I just thought I couldn’t control myself. Marcello must have read my mind.

  His hand gripped me tighter, and he licked my earlobe before whispering in a very authoritative way, “It’s a well-known fact that 98 percent of all guys jerk off—including priests.” He paused for a moment to let that information sink in. “And 2 percent lie.” He laughed.

  My laugh was nervous.

  He let go of me.

  “You have jerked off with your buddies before, haven’t you? I mean, isn’t that what goes on in the vestry?” He raised an eyebrow and quirked a grin.

  “No,” I said adamantly.

  “No, not in the vestry, or not at all?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Really? I thought every twelve-year-old boy jerked off with his buddies at one time or another.”
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  He was looking right at me, but I couldn’t look him in the eyes.

  “Not everyone. I didn’t.” I don’t know why I felt embarrassed admitting that.

  “Hey, I’m sorry. I should have known better.” He rubbed my shoulder. “We don’t have to do this.” He pulled me on top of him and kissed my lips. “We can just keep hugging and kissing if that’s what you want.”

  I moved my hips, and I could feel that we were both still hard. I reached my hand between us and grabbed him through his briefs the way he’d grabbed me.

  “I think this is what I want.”

  He gave me his devilish grin and rolled me to his side.

  “Have you ever seen an uncut cock before?”

  “Huh?”

  “I’m uncut. I’m not circumcised. I don’t want you to be surprised when you see it.”

  I was staring right at his bulge. But it was still fabric covered. How did an uncut cock look different? I was ready to find out. I reached out to take hold of his waistband. He sucked in his breath. Slowly I pulled the waistband down. I intentionally kept the band tight and trapped his bulge as I revealed his dark, coarse pubic hair. I kept pulling as his bulge shifted first horizontal and then downward and the base began to peek through his bush. Just like the rest of his skin, the little bit of cock that began to show was olive-colored, only a darker shade of olive. I kept pushing his waistband, and he lifted his hips and slid the back off his round butt.

  With his cock still trapped, I changed positions. I jumped up between his legs and took a hold of both sides of his waistband. As I pulled I revealed more and more of his dick. I could see his balls nested underneath before I’d come halfway down his length. My slow takedown must have been doing something for him because he’d begun to writhe and his fists gripped the tangled bedspread.

  He was breathing hard.

  “Careful. The head is really sensitive. That’s the best part of being uncut. But you’re making my shorts rub it and… oh, shit!”