Noah bit his bottom lip as he stared at Kaj’s mouth. “You’re trembling.”
“Because I want to punch you in the face.”
Noah tilted his head to the side as he looked into Kaj’s eyes. “What are you so afraid of?”
“I’m not afraid of anything. I’m just being realistic. You and I? That would be a fucking disaster.”
“The only disaster here is you being too stubborn to give in.”
They stood frozen in silence, locked in a battle of wills. Kaj wanted to look away, to break free, but he couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. And he definitely couldn’t stop his cock from pressing against the fly of his cargo pants. Why the fuck did fighting with this man turn him on so much?
For a moment there, as they glared at each other, Kaj thought Noah might try to kiss him, or maybe kick him. He wasn’t sure which option terrified him more. But then the door burst open, and they both took a step back as Xander strolled in.
“Dreadful’s about to finish up. We should start…” He trailed off, looking between them with narrowed eyes. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” Kaj bit out.
“Ten minutes, guys,” Ivar said as he barged into the room, looking like he’d been running a marathon. “Where the hell is Aksel?”
“He’s probably in one of the dressing rooms banging a chick from the venue’s staff,” Xander told the manager, but his eyes remained on the other two.
“Before the concert?” Ivar rolled his eyes. “Go get ready, I’ll find him.”
As the tour manager walked away, Kaj inhaled deeply, feeling the weight of Xander’s questioning gaze piercing through his skull. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to look back at him.
“I’m gonna get going,” Kaj mumbled, squeezing past Noah and Xander with a mix of determination and hesitation.
The echo of his boots reverberated in his ears, somehow louder than the corridor’s hustle as he headed toward the side of the stage, where the techs were waiting for them.
The overwhelming desire for Noah was consuming him, threatening to annihilate everything around him. Kaj needed to put an end to it, somehow. But right now, he had to get out there and put on a fucking show.
Thirteen
Backinthehotel,enveloped by the dark stillness of his room, Kaj tossed and turned in bed, frustration mounting as he tried to tune out the noise in his head.
Normally, the post-concert fatigue would grip him so completely that he would drift to sleep the second his body sank into the mattress. He’d wake up later in the night, but that initial surrender to exhaustion was always peaceful serenity. Not tonight.
The battle of contradictions he had been fighting before stepping on stage paled in comparison to what he felt now.
Noah was right; Kaj was being stubborn. Every cell in his being, from the fibers of his skin to his aching dick and the last one of his vital organs, was screaming at him to quench this insatiable thirst. What was the worst that could happen if he did?
The band losing another vocalist if they ended up entangled in a fistfight? Been there, done that.
The tour being cancelled? Highly improbable.
An emotional breakdown? He was living in a perpetual crisis these days.
Fuck it.
Kaj got up, dressed in the first thing he saw lying around, and crossed the hallway separating his room from Noah’s. He knocked on the door, nervously glancing at his sides. The last thing he needed was any of their bandmates, the managers, or the guys in the crew seeing him. Since he’d been so vocal about his disapproval of having Noah being part of this, there wasn’t a plausible explanation for him to be standing here at this hour other than getting a little action.
When nobody answered, he knocked harder. Nothing.
He tried one more time, gritting his teeth, “Come on, you fucking dipshit.”
A sleepy Noah appeared behind the half-opened door, squinting, looking like he didn’t even know where he was. “What… What’s going on, dude? It’s two—”
Without letting him finish, Kaj burst through the threshold and grasped his neck with both hands. He kicked the door closed, pressing his thumbs beneath Noah’s jaw as their mouths collided.
