One eyebrow lifts. “Was that the expectation?”
“It was,” I admit. “You haven’t exactly lingered before.”
He exhales, a sound halfway between a laugh and something heavier. His hand drifts to my waist, rests there without pulling me closer.
“Maybe I don’t trust myself to stay.”
The pull hits first, followed by the immediate need to shut it down. If we stay here unguarded, I lose the only advantage I still have. So I don’t let it get that far.
“You don’t have to,” I say lightly, even though the words land heavier than I intend. “There’s always coffee. And blowjobs. None of it has to mean anything outside of the moment.”
His mouth curves, slow and reluctant. His thumb presses once at my hip, grounding.
“That last one,” he says, voice low, “you’d have to prove.”
I slide down his body, slow and deliberate, aware of the way his breath changes as soon as I touch him. The control he keeps so tightly doesn’t disappear, but it frays at the edges.
When I take him into my mouth, his groan is unrestrained, raw enough to send heat racing through me.
“Iggyt,” he mutters, one hand threading into my hair, pushing lightly on my head.
I stay with him until his body tightens and gives, until the sound he makes is all instinct and no thought.
And I swallow.
When I come back up, his gaze is heavy, searching. Whatever flickers there is real but unspoken.
“Coffee,” he says quietly, his thumb brushing his come from my lip, “could be dangerous if you make a habit of that.”
I smile. “You seem to like danger. I aim to please.”
He runs his hand through his hair and looks up at the ceiling. Oh, what I would give to know what’s going through his mind.
We settle back together, warmth lingering between us. The edge is gone now, the control restored. That’s when I realize heat alone isn’t enough to keep this from becoming something else.
I want to know more about who Ridge Stone is, to understand what makes him the man that he is.
“So,” I say lightly, “tell me about these famous brothers of yours. You’re the oldest, right?”
“Oldest,” he says. “And the one who gets blamed when things go sideways.”
“My father didn’t believe in options,” he says at last. “Someone had to make sure things didn’t fall apart.”
“And now that someone is you.”
He nods once.
When his father’s name comes up, the shift is immediate. The tension returns, sharp and contained.
“Just over a week ago,” he says.
The weight of it settles between us.
“I’m sorry,” I say quietly.
He accepts it with a nod. Nothing more.
Silence stretches, thick with things neither of us says. Then he turns to me, deliberately changing direction.
