“Shut up.” Nate glanced away but didn’t try and free himself.
Progress.
And proof that Kaz wasn’t the only one feeling things here.
“What do you like about me?” he asked suddenly, pouting when Nate grunted.
“Who says I like you at all?”
“Don’t be like that, babe.” He moved in closer, so they were chest to chest. “Should I keep listing all the reasons I like you?”
“Do you?” Nate questioned. “Do you like me?”
“I more than like you, Pretty Boy.”
He shook his head, not accepting that answer. “You picked me off the street on a whim because you were pissed off at something Baikal said to you.”
“I admit,” he drawled, “it was childish and rash of me, but I don’t regret it. And that’s not why I’m still here. On some level, you’re aware of that, too.” Did it make Nate afraid? “You showed up at my school one time and I haven’t asked you to do it again. I haven’t even introduced you to Kal. If this was really about sticking it to him and proving some stupid point, wouldn’t I have done that by now?”
It'd been weeks since they’d started this and he’d had plenty of opportunity to do so. Honestly though, it hadn’t even crossed Kazimir’s mind to bring Nate around the rest of the Brumal since the first couple of days.
“I like how you respond to me,” he said, seeing that he was going to have to continue explaining in order to make his pretty racer understand. “I liked it that first night at your place. We fucked for hours and even though you were exhausted andspent, your body kept reacting to my touch. Chemistry like that is hard to come by.”
“Sexualchemistry,” he stated. “There needs to be more than that for a relationship to work. A real relationship, Kaz.”
“This is—”
“We haven’t even been on a date,” he cut him off. “This doesn’t count. I had no idea you were crashing the movies and you even bought the wrong tickets.”
“You enjoyed yourself anyway.”
“Yes,” Nate surprised him by saying. “I did. But so what? It’s like you just said. We’ve got amazing chemistry when it comes to the bedroom. How long before one or both of us gets sick of relying on sex to connect?”
“I don’t do that,” Kazimir argued.
“You use sex as a weapon,” he corrected. “Sex as a manipulation tactic. You think I don’t know what’s been up? That night you just so fondly spoke of? We didn’t do anything for hours. You fucked me until you’d worn me down and I was half out of my mind. I would have agreed to anything you wanted and you well know it. That was your end goal, after all.”
Kaz dropped his arms and stepped back. “You sound bitter.”
“I am.” He paused and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “I was. I should still be. That’s the problem, I don’t know anymore and that’s driving me half mad. You forced this on me. No sane person would want to be with you after that and yet…”
“And yet?” He held his breath, shocked to find there was a dark swirling foreign sensation in the center of his chest. Was he…apprehensive? Why? No matter what Nate was about to say, it wouldn’t change anything. Kaz was in control.
Right?
“I don’t know, Kaz,” Nate sighed. “I just…I don’t know.”
That’s it? He’d racked up the anticipation and made him nervous—which was a feeling Kazimir decidedly was not a fan of—all for that?
No.
“You’re going to have to give me more than that, Pretty Boy. We aren’t leaving this bathroom until you do.” It was on the tip of his tongue to threaten a repeat of their very first time together, when he’d taken him in that seedy bar bathroom, but Nate’s earlier words stopped him.
If Nate really didn’t like it…
“I don’t have to use sex as a control tactic,” he offered, figuring if he extended an olive branch first, maybe that would get him somewhere. He was used to interacting with people in the mafia, or at least those who were a part of that world. Nate wasn’t and never had been. Sure, he participated in the underground race scene, but from what Kazimir had observed, he mostly got in and got out.
Even Madden had mentioned the other day how Nate hadn’t been around as much since having to change careers so suddenly. Kaz still didn’t know if that was his friend's attempt to guilt trip him or what, but even if it hadn’t been, on some level, it’d worked. That was part of the reason Kaz had made that statement to Neve.
