He looked up at last, leaning into Declan’s touch.Declan curled his fingers.For comfort, was all.Comfort and tension that darkened Antonio’s eyes.Lust that burned like the drag of nails over skin, leaving line after line of praise.
“I’m being stalked by a wisp.Since the day they let me out, it’s been nothing but soft-voiced guys who get off on how ‘bad’ I am.”Frustration again, but only just, and none of it for Declan.“You wouldn’t believe how often I got asked if I ‘shivved’ anyone.”
“Bad boys aren’t my cuppa,” Declan admitted amidst the relief and hope and white heat that thrummed through him.His want.Theirs.“They always assumed I enjoyed getting pushed around.They saw that,” a dip of his chin toward the photos, “and made their own assumptions.No shiv questions, though.”
Antonio grinned.The expression went from amused to sharp-eyed interest quickly enough.Declan licking his lips may have had something to do with it.
“Yeah, well, I like cars with sharp lines and chrome.I like grit.You’re notpretty, Declan.”Not pretty, but Antonio’s eyes trailed over Declan’s leaning form, words low.“You’re not soft.You’re a murder punk.And it’s fucking hot.”
Murderpunk, razor edges and shine.Grit and claws and hard angles.
Declan knew Antonio’s desire to touch wouldn’t last past seeing him truly stripped to the skin.Once those forever moving hands ran over the ridges of ribs and jut of hips, feeling the truth of Declan being just as hollowed out as he looked.When their kiss carried pins and needles or involved the drag of a predator’s teeth.
Then again, Antonio’d never had a problem with nails.And Declan was never above taking what he could get before things went to the voids.
“I think I prefer ‘hot’ to ‘pretty.’Somehow, the men who start by saying ‘pretty’ always end up saying ‘slut.’”
Declan spread his fingers, touched as much as he could, and dragged his nails down to the back of Antonio’s neck.He needed to see the shift of expression over those strong features, witness what the play of claws through hairdidto him.
Antonio groaned, quiet, eyes shut briefly to press his head closer.“I’m notthatcrazy.”
“You’re not, are you?”
“Nah.Think you can settle for ‘hot piece of ass?’” Antonio slid the chair back, so he was facing Declan rather than the desk.Eager.Reaching.No murmured talk of being high or a subject change.
“I’ll cope.”
Declan took it upon himself to make himself comfortable on Antonio’s lap, one leg to either side.The bond’s purr turned to a song, thrumming at each point of contact.Loud, and louder still, with Declan’s heart in his throat and a hand curled around Antonio’s neck for balance.
“I’ve thought of this.”Declan shifted closer, wanting more of those muscles under him.His eyes dropped, began a study of where their legs touched.“I tried to decide how much my knees would need to spread to sit astride you like this.How you would feel under me.”
“Been trying so hard not to think about us, Murderpunk.Doing a shit job of it, too.”Antonio’s hand ran up Declan’s knee, his thigh, thumb pressed firm.
Declan wanted to nip that half-smile off his lips, then kiss it back.
“No specifics?”Declan kept his head tipped down if only to be able to look at Antonio from under his lashes and fall of short bangs.“I rather liked the clarity of ‘I want to ride you against a tree.’”
Antonio’s hand tightened.The other, he felt, blunt nails light over the line of his throat.The man hadlovelyhands; Declan lit under them, shivering.He wanted.All of him did, far and beyond the point where their bond knit them together.
“Been thinking about your nails on my back.Mapping every line of your skin,” his fingertip traced down Declan’s throat, presumably over one such line, “with my tongue.”His touch fell, found the first button on Declan’s shirt, and tugged.“Seeing more of you.All of you.”
Declan hesitated.He loathed himself for that.For the way he nearly bit his lower lip.He pushed it away, that ugliness, in favor of baring his throat for more of those touches, the ghost whisper of his thumb at the cut of Antonio’s jaw.
“If that desire changes, you’ll tell me?I won’t be cross.”
Sad, hurt, and resigned?Yes.But not angry.Not at Antonio.
“Not following, Murderpunk.”A button, open, and what Antoniodidfollow was the hint of collarbone, his touch electric.
“There’s either pins and needles or me proper.”Declan raised his free hand to trail over Antonio’s chest in turn, walking up the solid expanse, finger by finger, and tried to find the proper way to explain himself.“Both have their drawbacks, is all.Discomfort or … what you saw on the beach.”
He expected a joke.Something, perhaps, about finding the skeletons in biology class attractive.To take them out of the uncomfortable and back to solid ground.
But no.Of course not.
A firefly blink of anger from Antonio before he caught Declan’s hand, covering it with his own.He pressed Declan’s bone-white palm to his cheek, his calloused hand swallowing Declan’s slender one.
Caught and held, Declan watched as Antonio traced one long, sharp nail with his thumb, the gesture slow.Deliberate.
