“You can knot me,” Alex whispered as his own cock twitched and his balls clenched. “I want you to feel good, too. And when you do, I’m going to come again. I’m ready. All I need is just a little bitmore…”
The change in pressure happened almost immediately. Alex let the tightness invade him, closing his eyes and tilting his head back as he laughed. It felt too good not to. Purple exploded like fireworks behind his eyes, and he rode Laurence’s growing knot until it was so well-lodged within him that all he could do was squirm. Only then, filled and satisfied, did Alexcome.
Laurence’s lips were on his the second he came down from his high, kissing him not with greed, but with devotion. Alex kissed back. He cupped the back of Laurence’s head and held back hislaughter.
He’d never felt like thisbefore.
That evening, Alex’s only goal had been to ride Laurence to orgasm, then leave him for good. He’d wanted the purple gone, and the strange, stagnant melancholy out of his chest. But now he knew that if he left Laurence, he’d be in more pain than if he didn’t. He’d wanted to use Laurence to temporarily fill a hole in his heart, but instead, he’d found a man who wanted to take the time to stitch the wound shut without even realizing it wasthere.
They only stopped kissing when Laurence’s knot started to recede, and even then, it was only so Laurence could sigh in disappointment. He thrust into Alex a few more times as if trying to encourage the knot to take again, but his attempts were futile. For tonight, they weredone.
“We’ve got to stop doing that,” Laurence murmured. He kissed Alex’s cheek, right near hisear.
“Doingwhat?”
“Having sex without a condom. I know better. I bet you do,too.”
Alex hummed and wiggled his hips. “It doesn’t matter. I’m not inheat.”
“There are other reasons to use acondom.”
“And there are other reasons not to.” Alex grinned. He kissed the corner of Laurence’s lips. “I know it’s stupid, but we did it, and it was hot as hell. I don’t regretit.”
“Did it help you see the purple you were looking for? I assume you wanted it for your painting, right? Was it incomplete?” Laurence asked. He pulled back slowly, allowing Alex to drop his legs back down to the floor. The change in position was a relief, and for a moment, Alex lay still and stared at the ceiling. A smile spread across his face, which turned into a grin, which devolved into gleeful laughter that made Laurence laugh, too. “What’s sofunny?”
Alex brushed a tear from the corner of his eye. He understood now. It was so simple, it was stupid. The purple had never been right because what he wanted to expresswasn’tpurple. It had neverbeen.
Alex dropped his arm over his eyes, the crook of his elbow resting on the bridge of his nose. Now that he’d figured it out, it made so much moresense.
Attraction and affection? Those were purple. They manifested in different ways for different people and colored his world in shades and tints, but no matter how brilliant or dull the purple, it would never be right for what he wanted to convey. What he’d been trying to paint wasn’t lust, attraction, oraffection.
It was the first stirrings oflove.
Love, a complexity. It wasn’t purple. At its base, it was, of course—it sourced itself from tremendous affection and adoration. But it was more complex than that. Alex understood itnow.
It was the pale, distressed yellow that choked the part of Alex’s throat behind his collarbone with sorrow, and it was the stunning shade of shimmering blue that told Alex he was truly happy. It was the moody purples of attraction and affection as much as it was sickly, guiltygreen.
Love was everything. Purple nuanced by the experience of anotherperson.
And here, somehow, with a man he’d been looking to discard, he’d found it atlast.
He would never let itgo.
“Nothing.” Alex rubbed the tears away from his eyes and let himself smile. “I’m just happy, that’s all. Youdidhelp me figure itout.”
“Then I’d say tonight is asuccess.”
Laurence kissed him, and Alex grinned against his lips and kissed back. It was answerenough.
Laurence wouldn’t hurt him. He wasn’t the same as any of theothers.
With him, Alex wassafe.
22
Laurence
LoveHarley:Is he your boyfriend now,Gwynn?
