Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 77051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77051 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
I roll him onto his back. He goes easily, eyes dark and pleased like I’ve surprised him with a skill he suspected I had. I sit astride his hips and watch the way his gaze climbs me—hungry, yes, but reverent too. I can’t decide which makes me tremble more.
“You like steering,” he says, smiling up at me.
“With you?” I drag my palms over his chest, slowly. “I like everything.”
He laughs quietly. I kiss the laughter off his mouth, then follow the line of his throat with my lips. He shivers. I feel absurdly powerful and terribly tender at the same time. When I find a faint scar under his collarbone and press my mouth to it, his breath hitches.
“Climbing wall,” he admits on a shaky exhale. “College. Thought I was invincible. I wasn’t.”
I kiss it again like I’m filing away the story and the proof. He settles his hands at my waist, thumbs tracing little circles that make my bones fizz. The world narrows to the slow grind of heat and the rise and fall of our chests. Every brush of skin is a yes. Every yes stacks into a promise.
I glide over his dick, pushing it inside me. I rock against him, riding him slowly.
We don’t rush the last inches to the edge. We hover and approach, hover and approach—learning each other’s tells, calibrating like a pair programming session where everything clicks. He anchors me when I need it, mouth at my jaw murmuring things that turn my spine to silk. I take him with me when my breath breaks, and he goes gladly, like the only place he’s ever wanted to land is exactly here.
When the wave crests I say his name without meaning to. He says mine on a ragged breath, like a prayer that’s finally been answered.
After, we drift down together. There’s a long, bright quiet—the kind that makes you think maybe the universe has been trying to deliver you to this moment for a very long time. He doesn’t let go. He kisses my cheek, the tip of my nose, the corner of my mouth. I find the steady beat in his neck and lay my lips there, a thank you pressed to his skin.
We slide into the soft after of things, limbs a tangle under the blanket, breath syncing because that’s what our bodies keep doing without asking us. He tucks me under his chin and draws slow lines up and down my spine until the last static hum inside me goes quiet.
“Tell me something true,” I say into his chest, greedy for more of the inside pieces.
He thinks for maybe half a second. “I almost applied to art school.”
I tip my head back. “You?”
“Yeah.” He looks sheepish. “Charcoal sketching. I was bad at faces, though. Too much… feeling. Couldn’t get the eyes right.” His thumb sweeps my shoulder. “I like code because it tells you when you’re wrong. But drawing? It just sits there, daring you to try again.”
I smile. “I think you’d be good at trying again.”
“With you,” he says, no hesitation. “I want to try a lot of things again.”
It does something to me, the easy earnestness. I offer him a piece back. “When I was twelve, I taught myself to code by breaking my mom’s desktop. I cried for two days, then fixed it with a YouTube tutorial and a library book that smelled like dust and ketchup.”
He laughs, delighted. “Chaotic.”
“Correct.” I tuck my face into his throat. “Also, I’m afraid of deep water.”
His hand pauses. “Noted.”
“I don’t like not seeing what’s underneath.”
“You won’t have to,” he says. “I’ll go first. I’ll tell you where the drop-offs are.”
Something in my sternum loosens, like a knot finally untied. “I’m falling so hard, Gage,” I admit before I can be brave about it. “It scares me how much I want this. How much I want you.”
His arm tightens, drawing me closer like he’s bracing us both. “It scares me too,” he says, honest and steady. “But I’d rather be terrified with you than safe without you.”
We lie there trading small truths like currency—his need for background noise to sleep, my habit of double-knotting every pair of laces, the way he loses his train of thought whenever I tuck my hair behind my ear. He tells me Lark used to leave sticky notes on his monitor that said DRINK WATER and YOU’RE A STAR, and his mouth tips up when he says it. I tell him about the time I tripped in the cafeteria with a tray of spaghetti and learned humiliation can make a person allergic to attention. He squeezes my fingers like he’s rewriting that memory line by line.
Eventually the bright quiet returns. The room is a soft dark, and the river hushes like a sound machine beyond the glass. He tugs the blanket higher and tucks the edge under my shoulder, a small, tender habit I didn’t know I craved. I angle my face up, and he meets me with a kiss that’s more vow than heat, though there’s still plenty of heat simmering low.