The bed creaked, and chains rattled in chorus, almost as loud as Kit’s drumming pulse. His cock slapped upwards with the impact, painting precum on his stomach. Almost as hot as Holden’s breath against his lips.
Holden adjusted his grip on Kit’s thigh. His hand slipped, still wet with lube, then found enough purchase to bend Kit in half.
The next thrust punched even deeper, at just the right angle. Fuck. Kit was a tangled knot of pleasure, just seconds from unraveling. His toes curled. Another few thrusts, and he wouldn’t even need Holden to touch his cock.
“Do you want to come?” Holden asked—and stopped moving.
Kit squirmed, desperate for stimulation, but couldn’t move enough. Holden had him too thoroughly pinned. “Please, Holden, I’m so fucking close. You fucking bastard. Don’t you dare make me beg.”
Holden laughed breathlessly, eyes shining. “Looks like I don’t have to, huh?” He shoved deeper, grinding up. “You sound so fucking hot like this. You look so hot, all chained up for me.”
“Please,” Kit demanded. Definitely not begging. “Please, please, Holden, I need you. I need. Please, I—ah!”
Holden’s hand, slick with sweat and water and traces of lube, closed around Kit’s cock. The first gentle stroke drove Kit to the edge. The second sent him plummeting. Kit arched, straining against his cuffs, clinging tightly to Holden.
He was still trembling when Holden’s cum-soaked hand moved from his cock to his throat. Holden didn’t press down. Just held him.
“My darling,” Holden murmured, smearing the cum into Kit’s skin. “So perfect.”
He drove in, chasing his own orgasm in Kit’s oversensitive body. A few rough moments that Kit looked forward to feeling for days.
Then the revelation in Holden’s face. An expression Kit would remember forever.
Afterwards, Kit lay plastered against Holden’s chest, his hair no doubt drying into horrible shapes. Holden unchained Kit’s hands but left his feet bound together as they cuddled. Another echo of the kidnapping.
The familiarity was reassuring, in a fucked-up way. Holden could dig beneath Kit’s ribs without harming him. Kit was more trapped than ever, choosing to be here. The chains looped around his heart, not just his body.
Holden must be thinking of that night, too. “You saved me.”
“How?” Kit asked. Yeah, he’d persuaded the others not to kill Holden, but he sensed that wasn’t what Holden meant.
“You gave me a way to exist without destroying myself.” Holden toyed with Kit’s half-dried hair. “Sure, there are sometimes things you don’t want me to do. But you’ve never wanted me to change.”
Kit snuggled closer. “Except when I dumped you for being normal.”
Holden’s laugh rumbled through his chest. “Except then.”
Every sensation felt heightened. Sticky skin and drying hair and tangled bedsheets and the persistent well-fucked ache. Kit was present in his body, in a way that would normally scare him.
He couldn’t forget about the rest of the world forever.
Holden moved from Kit’s hair to his back, tracing abstract patterns. “What’s wrong, beautiful?”
Kit sighed, released reluctantly from silence. “I’m worried about the others.”
“What else?” Holden prodded.
Kit felt too safe and vulnerable to hide. “If I was alone, I would probably hurt myself.”
Holden froze. Kit held his breath, waiting for a reaction he couldn’t handle. Questions he didn’t want to answer.
But Holden just resumed tracing patterns along Kit’s spine. “You’re not alone,” he said, quiet and confident.
Kit relaxed. “I’m not.”
The confession was unexpectedly freeing. Better than bruises.
James paused in the shadow of a palm tree, one of a dozen flanking this side of the beach house. His shoulders burned for action. For deadly flight.
