Get it done and go to sleep.
But my dick doesn’t get the memo and a frustrated grunt snarls in my throat, neck straining as I grit my teeth, desperate for a blank release, all the while a deeper part of me knows it’s not enough. That even if I make it to the end, the gnarly itch in my belly will still be there.
An image invades my brain, unbidden and beautiful. I’m so bowled over by it that it takes me a moment to recognise Tamand his tattooed skin, ink staining his fingers as I pin his wrists over his head and steal a harsh kiss from his lips.
He tastes of sugar and cinnamon. He groans, and it’s the spark to the fire that I need. To shove me to that peak as a powerful release steams through me.
Wow. I draw it out a little, blinking through stunned and laboured breaths, as two things occur to me in rapid succession. One, that I’m pretty sure my Tam-themed fantasy was about to take me somewhere I rarely go with men. Two, it didn’t get that far because the mere thought of kissing him catapulted me off the edge.
I don’t know what to make of it, so I try not to make anything of it at all. I clean up and crawl back into bed, my heart still pounding like a runaway train. I like sex. When I’m not caught in my feelings, it’s freeing, and I don’t have many boundaries or hang-ups. But it’s been a while since I’ve come that hard, since an orgasm left me shaking, and it sends my mind into a spin all over again.
Idiot. Since when did knocking one out over someone dull their appeal?
Some time around never, and I roll onto my belly with a tortured groan, screwing my eyes shut as the fantasy I’ve just come to threatens to boil over again, tempered only by the kind of emotional flagellation that leaves scars on your soul.
You think he’s lying awake with you on his mind?
It feels as likely as the notion that Tam was flirting with me earlier, and it’s enough to smother the fire my misguided self-love has stoked in my blood.
Tam’s not thinking about me, so I need to stop thinking about him. Tam Dubois. Mylandlordand a man I’ve known for less than two weeks and I’m already?—
Nope.
Not doing it.
I force myself to sleep and wake up with an iron curtain around my mind.
Get up.
Run.
Eat.
Find a new hobby.
Great advice and I heed every scrap of it, until I exit the annex in my long-neglected workout clothes to find a bag of groceries on the doorstep, complete with a work-of-art note that melts the barrier I’ve imagined into a puddle at my feet.
Bhodi Jones,
You need to eat. Don’t let life stop you.
Tam x
Seven
TAM
I’m dead.
I thought it would wear off, the wild feeling in my chest every time I’m near Bhodi. Then I accidentally caught a glimpse of him lying half naked in bed with his cock in his fist and everything I’d put down to the temporary thrill of making a new friend, who just so happens to be hotter than sin, solidified. Put down roots.Cementedthat shit in my brain.
He’s not something I think about anymore.
He’sallI think about, and it’s freaking me out.
“Merde, you have it bad.” Sab gets in my face, literally. For the first time in a while, we’re not bickering through a phone screen. He’s in my garden, inspecting my work on the fence under the pretence that he’s not trying to catch a glimpse of Bhodi. “How hot is this lodger, exactly?”
“Hot enough.” I speak from the back door. It’s raining and if there’s one thing I hate more than being cold, it’s being wetand cold. Also, Bhodi’s not even home. I just like watching Sab waste his time.
