Chapter 4: Sauna Submission
The gym was supposed to be sanctuary. For two days, Jake had treated it like a battleground. He’d pummeled the heavy bag until his knights were raw, stacked plates on the leg press until his vision spotted, chasing a fatigue so complete it would drown out the memory of Malik’s hand on him, the sound he’d made, the humiliating, powerful relief of his own surrender. It wasn’t working. Every rep was quieter, the silence in his head filling with replay.
He headed to the sauna out of habit, a final ritual to sweat out the last of the lactic acid and, he hopelessly wished, the rest of it. The cedar box was empty, thank god. He slumped on the highest bench, the heat immediately pressing down on his lungs, a tangible weight. He tipped his head back against the wall, eyes closed, and tried to find a neutral zone in the dark behind his eyelids.
The door hissed open. A wave of cooler, damp hallway air swept in, followed by the solid, unmistakable presence of another body. Jake didn’t need to look. The atmosphere in the small room changed, charged, the steam itself seeming to coil differently.
Malik sat on the bench opposite, not beside him. The silence wasn’t the comfortable quiet of strangers. It was a loaded, living thing. Jake kept his eyes shut, pretending sleep, pretending peace.
“You’ve been going hard,” Malik said finally, his voice cutting through the dull roar of the generator. “Trying to lift it away?”
Jake said nothing. He felt Malik’s gaze on him like a physical touch.
“It doesn’t work like that.” A statement of fact. The scrape of wood on wood as Malik shifted. “The data’s in. You can’t delete it.”
“Can you just… not?” Jake muttered, eyes still closed.
“Not what? Talk about the only thing that’s real between us now?” Malik’s tone was conversational, almost bored. “You think if we don’t talk about it, it goes back to normal? You’ll go back to flexing in the mirror, thinking I’m just your bro?”
Jake’s eyes snapped open. Malik was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, watching him. He was shirtless, sweat already glazing his dark skin, tracing the cut of his obliques. The sight was no longer just aesthetic; it was a catalog of knowledge. Jake knew the feel of that shoulder under his desperate grip.
“What do you want, Malik?” The question came out tired, defeated.
Malik stood up in one fluid motion. The small space made the movement feel like an invasion. He didn’t speak. He just walked over and, with a flat palm on Jake’s chest, shoved him back against the hot cedar wall.
The breath left Jake in a grunt. The wood was searing. Before he could react, Malik’s body was crowding him in, one hand planted on the wall by his head, the other rough palm sliding down the center of Jake’s quivering stomach. The touch wasn’t sexual; it was proprietary, a claim check on territory.
“Everybody thinks you’re straight,” Malik murmured, his lips close to Jake’s ear. The steam made the words cling. “The guys here. The girls at the bar. You believe it, most days. You sell it real good.” His hand stopped just above the waistband of Jake’s shorts, fingers splayed over the defined ridges of his lower abs. “But I know different. I know what’s underneath the show. I know how bad you need it.”
Jake’s heart was a frantic animal against his ribs. “Need what?” he whispered, though he knew.
Malik’s hand dipped, just slightly, the backs of his fingers pressing against the fabric. Jake was already hard, the response instantaneous and traitorous. Malik chuckled, a low, dark sound that vibrated in the humid air. “You know exactly what. You held it. You tasted it on your hand for two days.” He leaned even closer, his nose almost brushing Jake’s temple. “You need my cock between those perfect lips. You need to know what that does. It’s the only data point left.”
The vulgarity, the sheer impossibility of the demand, should have sparked fury. Instead, a terrifying lassitude washed through Jake. A sense of inevitability. Malik was right. The other side of the line had been explored. This was the next, logical, horrifying coordinate. The fight was gone, burned away in the sauna’s heat and the older, more persistent heat Malik carried with him.
Malik saw the surrender in the slump of Jake’s shoulders, the way his head tilted back, exposing his throat. He stepped back, just enough. His hands went to his own towel, loosening it. He let it fall.
There, in the dense, shifting mist, it was even more daunting. The flickering, low-wattage bulb cast it in shadow and highlight, emphasizing the sheer mass of it, the heavy curve, the prominent veins like topography under skin. It was fully erect, a fact of brutal architecture that dominated the space between them. It wasn't just its size, though that was staggering; it was the absolute confidence of its presence, an instrument that knew its own power.
Jake stared, his mouth dry.
“Go on,” Malik said, his voice quiet but absolute. “No one’s coming in. They’re all at the abs class.”
The world shrank to the space between the benches. The steam was a curtain. The smell of cedar and sweat and salt was overwhelming. Jake felt detached, watching himself slide off the high bench onto his knees on the damp, slatted wood floor. The position was a humiliation and a relief all at once. He didn’t have to think here. He just had to obey.
He leaned forward, the heat from Malik’s skin palpable. He hesitated, his breath ghosting over the tip.
“Look at me,” Malik commanded.
Jake’s eyes flickered up. Malik’s expression was intense, focused, a scientist awaiting a result. There was no cruel smile, just an unwavering expectation.
Jake opened his mouth. The first contact was a shock of salt and heat. It was too much to take, so he didn’t try. He used his tongue first, a tentative swipe along the underside from base to tip, learning the texture, the iron-hardness beneath the velvet skin. Malik’s abdominal muscles clenched. A low, approving hum echoed in the chamber.
Emboldened, Jake took the head into his mouth. He had to stretch his jaw, a dull ache beginning immediately. He concentrated on the mechanics, the way he would a new lift. Breathe through the nose. Relax the throat. He swirled his tongue, pressed against the slit, experimented with suction.
Malik’s hand came down, not to push, but to cradle the back of Jake’s head. The touch was shockingly gentle. “Yeah,” he breathed, the word misting in the air. “Just like that. Slow. Get used to it.”
Jake did. He worked slowly, methodically, taking more inch by torturous inch. The stretch was intense, a burning strain in his jaw muscles. Tears of effort welled in the corners of his eyes, mingling with the sweat and steam on his face. The weight on his tongue, the feeling of fullness, the sheer reality of what he was doing short-circuited all thought. There was only the rhythm, the taste, the sound of Malik’s ragged breathing above him, and the building, undeniable tug of arousal in his own gut.
Malik’s fingers tightened slightly in Jake’s damp hair. “You’re a natural,” he murmured, his voice thick. “All that control… you just redirect it.” His hips gave a tiny, involuntary thrust, burying himself deeper.
Jake gagged, pulling back, strings of saliva breaking. He coughed, eyes watering.
Malik didn’t apologize. He just looked down, his gaze blazing. “Again.” It wasn’t a request.
And Jake went back. Because the data was compelling. Because the power to make Malik—stoic, aggressive, controlled Malik—sound like that, to feel his legs trembling, was a drug more potent than any pride. He serviced him with a focused, aching dedication, lost in the fog and the impossible task, every soft choke and muffled groan from above a point on a graph he was desperate to complete.
He didn’t know how long it lasted. Time dissolved in the heat. His jaw was a solid ache, his knees sore against the wood. He was achingly hard himself, painfully trapped in his shorts, but that need was a distant secondary thing.
Malik’s breathing hitched, turned sharp. His grip became vice-like. “Look at me. Now.”
Jake, his mouth full, dragged his eyes upward. Malik’s face was a mask of strained ecstasy, his lips parted, his nostrils flared. The sight sent a final, violent thrill through Jake.
“Swallow it,” Malik gasped, the command fracturing. “All of it.”
The culmination was swift. Jake stayed, eyes locked on Malik’s as he shuddered through it, taking the hot, bitter pulses down his throat until Malik finally, spent, sagged back against the opposite bench.
The silence returned, heavier now, saturated. Jake knelt on the floor, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, his own need a screaming, ignored ache. He felt gutted. Used. And terrifyingly, profoundly useful.
Malik looked at him, his chest heaving. He reached down, his motion slow with exhaustion, and tucked himself back into his towel. His expression was unreadable again, the mask sliding back into place. But his eyes held something new when they looked at Jake—a satisfied, deep-seated knowledge that went beyond possession.
He stood, stepping over Jake’s kneeling form as if he were just another piece of gym equipment. He paused at the door, hand on the handle.
“See you at home,” he said, and left.
The hiss of the door faded into the roar of the heater. Jake stayed on his knees, the taste imprinted on him, the strain in his jaw a permanent landmark. The sanctuary was gone. The gym, the sauna, his own body—none of it belonged to him anymore. They were just extensions of the experiment, and he was the instrument, finally understanding his purpose.