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would be a very tight fit, if Matthew ever let him—
    What the fuck was he thinking? He never bottomed!
    “But you think I’m attractive, yes?” Dove pressed again, looking hopeful.
    “Yeah.” Matthew reached for another cigarette to light up. His hands were shaky so it took him a few extra seconds, but he wanted Dove to take him for indifferent. Better for both of them if he did.
    Dove pouted. “Attractive to sleep with or attractive to look at?”
    “Both, but then I like men, right? You may prefer women.”
    “I have to like one or the other?” Dove sounded plaintive. “Can’t I like both?”
    Matthew shook his head ruefully at Dove’s persistence. “I don’t think it matters if you really like someone, but that’s just me,” he admitted.
    “That’s what I think!” The angel sat down on the couch and took Matthew’s cigarette away. “I like you a lot, Matthew-friend, and I want to know what it is to have sex.”
    “Shit!” Matthew got up and moved away from sweet temptation. “You can’t!”
    “Why not?” His angel looked cranky now. His erection was also still interested, pointing straight out as if to say: blow me, Matthew, you know you want to!
    “Because you don’t know what you want, not really. Or…” Matthew swallowed, “you’d know it wouldn’t be me.”
    “Matthew, what aren’t you saying?” Dove stood up, and Matthew just knew there was a hug in his future. He couldn’t bear it.
    “Go to bed!” he barked. He snagged the jean jacket he’d loaned his angel earlier.
    “Where are you going?” Doe eyes followed him.
    “Out!” Matthew hesitated, looking back at a panicked-looking angel. “I’ll be back, don’t worry, but you don’t want me, all right? You could do better.”
    He slammed the door behind him, before he did something he knew he had no right to.
     
    *  *  *
    Matthew stayed out very, very late. He drank a little. Watched strippers, male and female. Wiping his gritty eyes, trying to forget the beautiful angel in his bed waiting for him at home.
    Who wanted to sleep with him. Who wanted Matthew to show him how to have sex. And Matthew knew he could make it good, oh, so good for his angel.
    Touch him, taste him, fucking worship him, thoroughly.
    But what had his gut twisted was that he knew he’d only kill something in Dove if he gave in.
    Soil him.
    He toyed with his glass, the last person who should be the guardian to an angel.
     
    *  *  *
    Matthew stumbled into his apartment, unshaven, groggy, just before dawn.
    Dove sat up in bed, blinking at him, demanding, “Did you find someone else attractive?”
    “Yeah,” Matthew lied, hating himself for hurting Dove’s budding feelings, but he couldn’t take advantage of his innocence. “Yeah, I did.” He couldn’t look into Dove’s wide dark eyes. He turned away.
    “Oh. You wanted someone, but not me.” Dove sounded very depressed.
    “Yeah. Had a good fuck, and now I’m tired, so go to sleep, Dove.”
    “But you didn’t sleep with him like a boyfriend?”
    “I told you. I don’t sleep with anyone.”
    Matthew took off his clothes, feeling really shitty. Being good was crappy! He was much happier when he did shit to suit himself, but how could he look in those untarnished eyes and use his angel like all the rest?
    He was reaching for the blanket he’d used on the couch when he caught the sound of a suppressed sob. Oh, fuck.
    “Dove?” He turned on the light and saw his angel had tears in his eyes.
    “I hurt, Matthew,” Dove said simply. “You don’t want me and I hurt.”
    Matthew pulled his jeans back on and went to Dove. He sat on the corner of the bed and patted his angel’s knee awkwardly.
    “You don’t want to be with me and it hurts!”
    Matthew shifted closer and brushed Dove’s muscled shoulders with his fingertips while he rested his forehead against his angel’s. “I want to be with you very badly,” he confessed. “I hurt too.”
    “I don’t understand you,