Chapter Sixteen
Danny hummed happily into Eliot’s mouth as he woke, reaching out to grab hold of him. He could get used to waking up like this.
He was starting to think hewantedto get used to waking up like this. He’d been so sure he wasn’t ready for a relationship, but Eliot…
Eliot was different. Completely different, not like anyone Danny had ever been with before. That should have meant they were totally incompatible—they barely had a single thing in common—but Danny couldn’t help feeling at peace when Eliot was around.
They made a strange kind of sense together. It was early days, and maybe Danny was getting ahead of himself, but it didn’t seem like the kind of feeling he should just ignore.
“Morning,” he murmured, his voice rough from disuse. Eliot made a soft, happy sound as he broke away, pressing his nose into Danny’s cheek.
“Good morning, gorgeous,” he said, beaming broadly as he backed off far enough for Danny’s eyes to focus on him.
Danny’s eyes rolled back in his head as Eliot wrapped his hand around his cock and gave it a single, quick tug. He whimpered as Eliot took his hand away again, dismayed.
Eliot chuckled. “That’s just to remind you how much you want me,” he said. “I hate to leave you like this, but I have to get to work.”
“Call in sick,” Danny said, hopeful. He didn’t want Eliot to go, especially on a day when he didn’t have anything else to do.
Eliot had told him on their first date that he liked sex. That had definitely turned out to be true. Everything they’d done had felt good.
Not just physically, but emotionally, as well. There was no guilt, no worry, nothing other than bone-deep satisfaction and a tiny bit of disappointment that Eliot wasn’t going to stay.
“Any other day, I would.” Eliot smiled slowly, leaning closer to kiss Danny again. It was soft, and warm, and Danny wanted as much of it as he could get.
He wanted to kiss Eliot until they were both breathless and exhausted, reduced to lying there together, curled up under the blankets and touching from knees to shoulders.
Danny couldn’t remember ever wanting that before. Not with a specific person, at least. He’d always wanted to feel that way, but he never had.
Whether or not it was a good idea, he was falling for Eliot. Had been falling for Eliot.
Maybe, had already fallen.
“But today, I really, really have to go,” Eliot said as he broke away again, rolling out of bed and starting to gather his clothes. They’d been left in a winding trail that went from the front door to the bedroom, right next to Danny’s.
Danny glanced at the clock. Five am.
He smiled to himself. Eliot was up at five for him, despite the fact that he’d declared it too early when they’d first met.
That felt good. He must have known how early he’d need to get up if he stayed the night. He must have set his alarm in the car on the way home.
And he’d still stayed.
To Danny, that meant the world. It was such a tiny thing, but it was proof that he wasn’t alone in being way more invested in this than he was supposed to be.
“I’ll text you,” Eliot called from the hall, having gathered everything he needed from the bedroom. “Later, beautiful.”
Danny laughed.
No, Dannygiggled. Not that he was ever going to admit to that.
Eliot thought he was beautiful.
He flopped back on the bed, looking up at the ceiling and feeling more or less like a sixteen-year-old with a crush. His heart swelled in his chest as he thought of Eliot, even though he could hear him leaving.
It didn’t matter that he was leaving. It mattered that he’d been here, and that he wasn’t running away.
The next time he looked at the clock, it was a little after seven. He hadn’t intended to doze off, but Eliot had worn him out. Even though he didn’t go for a run in the morning anymore, his body still usually woke him at around five and wouldn’t let him go back to sleep.
