A few minutes later, I knock on our bedroom door. My heart is beating so loudly, I’m not even sure the knock was audible because I couldn’t hear it over the throbbing in my ears. The door opens, and Ari steps to the side to let me in.
The bedroom is transformed. He’s made the bed with silky blue sheets, there are blue curtains on both sides of the bed and on the window, and there are faint blue lights coming from multiple sources—string lights hanging over the curtains, LED lights along the wall around the bed, and small blue puck lights dotted around the room on the shelves and nightstands.
The door clicks shut and I turn around, taking Ari in. He’s wearing a very small robe and mask made out of the same color and fabric as my pants and the button-down shirt I left open. His eyes trail down my torso like a physical touch, then he reaches out a hand.
“Your key, please,” he says, in the same tone that an attendant at the club would use.
I hold the key out, pressing it into his palm but not letting it go.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want,” Ari says, as if he thinks I need to hear the words. Like he’s not handing me everything right now.
“I know that.”
“And if you’re not ready, you?—”
“Option three,” I blurt out quickly, and too loudly.
His lips pull up into a smile. I’m not sure if he’s happy about my outburst or making fun of me.
“Before you answer, I want to make sure you understand what your three options are.”
My eyes hold his. “Ari?—”
“Let me say it,” he interrupts gently.
I nod and let him take the key from my grasp. My arm falls to my side, and I wait, giving him the space he needs to say what he needs to say.
“Option one,” he begins, “is no longer an option. After what we’ve shared between us, I can’t pretend that none of this is real. We can’t go back that far. Option one is now stopping all of this and focusing on just being bandmates, and brothers if we can, but it still doesn’t go away.”
I nod my assent. That’s fair. I raise an eyebrow, wondering how much the other options have changed.
“Option two is that we keep doing this, but quietly. Only in the dark, or in stolen moments. It’s a physical thing only, and we keep it hidden.”
His eyes flicker, and I wonder if he thinks I’m going to choose option two. It’s safer for both of us, and there’s less chance of things getting as messy as they could going all in. It’d be a lie, though, because this is already more than just a physical thing.
“What’s option three?” I ask when the silence has gone on a second too long.
“Option three,” he says, “is you bending me over this bed and fucking me right now. Let go of all this pretense and just fucking take me the way we both know you want me. Fully. Not in public—not right now, at least—but here, between us. Take me and choose me, not as a brother or a friend or a bandmate, but as someone youwant.”
I let a beat pass, one loud throb of my heart, and say again, without hesitation. “Option three.”
Ari’s posture all but caves in on itself, like the relief was the only thing holding him upright. He straightens his spine again, and with his eyes locked on me, he smiles dangerously as he pulls the tie holding his robe together. It falls open, exposing his… well, everything.
Rather than attempting to take him all in at once, I start with the smooth expanse of his stomach, his slim waist and defined abs. It’s all accentuated by a garment that isn’t one solid piece so much as straps combined to tease, confuse, and give me a heart attack all at once.
A slim band sits low on his hips, framing the narrow cut of his waist. From there, angled straps descend in sharp V-shapes, meeting and crossing in clean, geometric patterns. The crisscrossing straps create an open space between the bands, little flashes of skin that are calculated rather than chaotic.
The material has a sheen similar to the satin of his robe and my outfit but looks sturdier. It clings to the curve of his hips and traces down his pelvis, where the straps continue, wrapping around each of his upper thighs. They hug him just right, snug without being too tight, emphasizing his muscles in a way that feels deliberate. Small silver hardware pieces anchor theintersections, catching the light and glinting sharp and clean against the blue.
The structured architectural design and cut are distinctly masculine, yet somehow still soft in the way it highlights his curves and leads the eye to the largest of the open spaces between the straps. His cock is completely exposed, hard and jutting out proudly, beckoning me.
It’s bold and shocking and the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen another person wear. Almost like a harness, except it’s undeniably intimate and soft.
As though he doesn’t know exactly what the sight of him is doing to me, Ari lets the robe slide off his shoulders and fall to the floor, leaving him in nothing but the tantalizing art piece framing all the places I want to bury my face and never come up for air.
I’m frozen as he walks up to me, cupping me through my thin satin pants. I’m so hard it almost hurts to be touched. A breathy shudder leaves me as he runs this thumb over the wet spot at the apex of the tent in my pants.
“Good choice,” he murmurs against my lips, squeezing me gently before moving past me, fingers lightly chasing over my abs as he walks by.
