I know what I'm worth to the Board. Risk profile. Liability. A name on a list of facilities. Montana. Washington. Somewhere far enough that the bonds snap.
What I don't know — what I haven't let myself look at directly — is what I'm worth to him.
"Leo."
He turns. The amber is up, low and steady. He's been looking at me the whole time. He never stopped.
"If they transfer me," I say, "I'll turn this into something manageable. Something I can carry without it being heavy." I look at him. "I don't want to do that."
He's very still.
"So don't," he says.
I close the three inches between us. My hand finds the side of his face — rough jaw, warm skin. He covers my hand with his. Holds it there.
Then he kisses me, and it's not careful.
We go down onto the bed together. The narrow mattress barely holds us. Neither of us cares.
His mouth moves to my jaw, my throat. His hands push up under the hem of my shirt and his palms are warm against my ribs and I arch into it before I decide to. He pulls the shirt over my head and looks at me in the dark.
"Don't be careful with me," I say.
He reads me. Whether it's bravado. Whether I mean it.
I mean it.
His mouth drops to my collarbone, my breast, his tongue tracing heat down my sternum, lower. His hands work my pants down and I lift my hips and then his fingers are between my thighs and I'm already wet and he makes a low sound against my stomach that does more damage than anything else so far.
"Jesus," he says, quiet. Like he's talking to himself.
His fingers move and I stop being able to track anything. Two of them pressing into me, slow, deliberate, his thumb working in circles while his mouth comes back up to my throat. I grab his hair and pull and he speeds up. The orgasm builds fast — faster than I expect — three weeks of bond-heat and wanting and refusing to want and now his hand between my legs taking it apart methodically.
I come with my face pressed into his shoulder, his name bitten back in my throat, the bond blazing gold in my wrist, my whole body shaking through it.
He eases me down. His fingers gentling. His mouth soft at my temple.
Then I push him onto his back.
He lets me — which tells me something. I take him in my mouth, slow, and the sound he makes is the least controlled thing I've heard from him. His hand finds my hair. Doesn't push. Just holds, like he needs something to grip. I work him until his hips start moving and his breathing goes ragged, and when he's close I pull off and sink down onto him instead.
He swears. His hands find my hips.
"Alex —"
"I know," I say. And move.
His cock fills me completely and I feel every inch of the stretch as I rise and drop, setting a pace that has his jaw clenching and his hands gripping hard enough to bruise. His hips roll up to meet mine. His thumb finds the place that makes my vision go white at the edges and I curse and he does it again, watching my face, cataloguing me the same way I catalogue everything — exits, pressure points, every place that makes me fall apart.
"You're going to come again," he says. Not a question.
"Shut up," I say, and do.
The second one crests harder — my back arching, his name not bitten back this time, my body locking down around him until he follows with his hips stuttering and his face buried in my neck and both of us breathing like we've been running.
After, the narrow bed holds us.
His arm across my waist. My face against his chest, his heartbeat under my cheek — steadier than mine, which has always annoyed me about him.
