Apparently, packing up the apartment called for light gray sweatpants. Which had a wonderful tendency to emphasize what else Darius was packing.
“I’m good,” Darius said, setting the box down next to the others. The small cardboard army huddled along the wall between the kitchen and the TV. A muted college basketball game played on the screen, Devil Whales vs. Woodcocks. “Don’t touch that box, all right?”
Kit straightened up.
Then he leaned his elbow against the arm of the couch, trying to cover his sudden alertness. “Why? What’s in it?”
By Darius’s eyeroll, Kit’s feigned nonchalance wasn’t fooling him. “If I was willing to answer that, I wouldn’t tell you to stay away.”
“Is it dangerous?” Kit asked, twirling a finger in his hair. “Is it a bomb?”
“It’s not a bomb,” Darius said. He picked up the packing tape and moved to a different open box.
As the tape screeched out in Darius’s hands, Kit moved to the coffee table. Swinging his legs put his sock-covered toes mere inches away from the mysterious Do Not Touch box.
“Is this too close?” Kit asked, in an innocent voice.
Darius folded down the top of the other box. He didn’t seem to look up, but there was a one-hundred-percent chance he knew exactly what Kit was doing.
Kit inched closer, toes stretching just shy of the forbidden cardboard. “Is this too close?”
Darius finished taping down the box. “If you want to get fucked, pretty boy, you can just say so.”
Kit froze for a second, foot outstretched. Then he grinned. “Where’s the fun in that?”
He could ask, sure. But sometimes it was more satisfying to provoke the first move from someone else. Especially right now, when things were all moving around. The situation was changing. Transitions, evolutions, tidal waves, the slow erosion of changing winds.
Everyone was doing exactly what Kit wanted. Moving in together. And that meant his own fears were bubbling up in the back of his mind. The more external problems he fixed, the less he had to blame for the internal problems.
Thankfully, some of Kit’s problems were easy to solve. Like feeling super needy and craving a hard fuck.
Kit stretched just enough to barely tap the box with his toe.
“You’re terrible,” Darius said, but he didn’t sound mad at all.
Darius set the tape next to Kit, then knelt so close, his body forced Kit’s knees apart. Kit leaned forward, his quickening pulse anticipating a kiss. Instead, Darius carefully, firmly held Kit by the throat.
Kit swallowed against Darius’s callused palm.
“Terrible,” Darius murmured again. He spoke mere inches from Kit, close enough that his breath caressed Kit’s lips. “Maybe I should box you up and tape it shut, to keep you out of mischief.”
Kit’s pulse raced even faster. That sounded kind of hot. Kind of scary. Both reactions twisted together, and he couldn’t tell which was stronger. He imagined folding into the uncomfortable space, arms bound behind him, darkness pressing around him. The air filling with his own breath. The cardboard wouldn’t be air-tight, of course, but that could get hard to remember when he couldn’t move.
Secure. Owned. Trapped. Helpless. Treasured.
Maybe Darius would shove a vibrator up him first, and he’d squirm and squirm. That would be hot.
Or scary.
“Too much?” Darius asked, stroking Kit’s throat.
Kit leaned into the touch. Enough to threaten his own breath, until Darius held him in place. “I’m not sure.”
“‘Not sure’ means it’s too much,” Darius said.
Kit bit back a protest, because Darius was right, ugh. “For today, at least,” Kit said quickly. He didn’t want the idea taken completely off the table.
Darius grinned. “While we’re being honest, I prefer restraining you where I can see you.”
