Couldn't think about anything except the heat of his body against mine. The way his back arched into me. The sounds he was making—quiet, desperate, muffled against his forearm where he'd braced it against the wall.
My cock was pressed against his ass and I was grinding into him and my hand was wrapped around him and the rhythm was building.
"Liam—fuck—"
"I got you," I whispered against his neck. "I got you."
And then a thought hit me that I wasn't prepared for.
I want to be inside him.
Not someday. Not theoretically. Right now.
The want was so specific it almost hurt—the image of pushing into him, of being that close, of nothing between us at all.
This was new. This was different. This was my body telling me something my brain hadn't caught up to yet.
I didn't act on it. Not here. Not without talking about it first, without knowing if he wanted it too.
But the want was there.
I focused on what we were doing. The rhythm of my hand. The pressure of my hips. Alex's body responding to every movement—his back muscles tensing under my chest, his breath coming in short gasps, the way he pushed back into me like he couldn't get close enough.
"Faster," he whispered.
I tightened my grip. Sped up. Felt his whole body go rigid.
"I'm close," he said. "Liam—I'm—"
"Yes."
His hand slammed against the tile wall. His body locked up—every muscle, every tendon, and I felt him come in my hand. Hot. Pulsing. A sound ripping out of him that he tried to muffle against his arm and couldn't quite kill.
The sound of him—the feeling of him coming apart while I held him—pushed me over the edge.
I pressed my face into the back of his neck and came against him. Hard. My vision whiting out, my hips jerking, my hand still on him as the last waves rolled through us both.
For a long time we just stood there. The water running. Our breathing wrecked. His back against my chest, my forehead against his shoulder, my arm around his waist.
I didn't want to move. Moving meant separating. Separating meant the world came back—the boathouse, the teams, the performance, the coaches, the race. Right now there was nothing except his heartbeat against my chest and the steam and the water and the sound of us breathing together.
I'm not sure how long we stood there.
Alex moved first. Turned around. Faced me.
He looked wrecked. Open. No mask, no composure, no Harrington polish. Just him—hair plastered to his forehead,chest still heaving, eyes that weren't calculating a goddamn thing for once.
He kissed me. Soft.
"That was dangerous," he said.
"Yeah."
"Really dangerous."
"Yeah."
A beat. Water running between us.
