He even eats the avocado toast. It takes everything inside me to not beam with pride.
“That was good,” Nolan says with great reluctance.
“Eggs are good for you.”
Nolan snorts. “Are you a nutritionist?”
“I just believe in getting a well-rounded diet to fuel my body. Eat the rainbow and all that.”
“I bet that’s shit your moms say.”
I smile at the mention of my moms. He’s right. That is shit they say.
“My mom does believe in eating the rainbow.”
“Awful euphemism in certain contexts.” Nolan wiggles his eyebrows obnoxiously.
“We’re up with the sun. What should we do?”
Nolan tiredly points towards the backyard. “Go swim some of your golden retriever out. I’ll watch.”
I do love to swimandhe has a nice pool. The sun just starts to break over the horizon, splashing the sky with pinks and purples as I walk naked out to the pool. I can practically feel Nolan’s eyeson me the entire walk. Dipping my toes into the warm water, I turn my head over my shoulder to meet Nolan’s heavy gaze. When I toss him a grin, he scowls and shoos me along with a wave of his hand.
Diving into the water, I break through the surface with a pleased sigh. It’s the perfect temperature, almost like bath water. I swim a few laps to warm up, then do exactly as Nolan said. My muscles burn as I swim back and forth without pausing, thinking over the past twelve hours at this hidden mansion in the hills. Thoughts of Nolan and the way he was with me last night run on repeat in my head. Figuring him out is going to be impossible.
I only stop swimming when Nolan’s figure shimmers through the turquoise water. Coming to a stop at the edge, I rest my arms against the pool deck while gasping in much-needed air. Nolan stares down at me in serious contemplation. He’s still only wearing those loose sweatpants that always look one breath away from falling to the floor.
“You’ve been swimming nonstop for thirty minutes,” Nolan points out, sounding just shy of petulant.
I grin up at him as I wipe water from my face. “You told me to swim my golden retriever out.”
“I was joking.”
I frown. “Oh.”
Nolan casts his gaze out to the hills spread out behind his house. Something in his eyes hurts me; his gaze is beyond tortured. He always looks one moment away from spilling some dangerous secret that might tear him apart to speak aloud. I reach out to curl my fingers around his warm ankle, and smile when his skin is warm beneath my touch.
“Join me,” I whisper softly.
Nolan angrily kicks my fingers away with a snarl. But he shoves his sweatpants down to the ground, kicking them off towards the sunning chairs. He doesn’t jump into the pool likeI did, instead he slowly walks in on the stairs. The sun hits the water at just the right angle so that he looks like some sort of miserable god returning to their ocean kingdom. He’s stunningly beautiful, despite the pain that radiates from his very core.
“What?” Nolan asks roughly as he pauses in front of me.
“You’re beautiful,” I say and immediately regret it.
But Nolan doesn’t hiss or spit at me, instead he flushes slightly and looks away. I curl my palms around his slim hips and tug him closer, until he’s close enough that I can smell the rich amber scent of him. His fingers dig into the meat of my back as I kiss along his neck. Pulse pounding beneath my lips, I grin against the skeleton fingers tattoo. When I take his ear between my lips and suck, his breath stutters out of him, his fingers digging even more painfully into my back where the deep scratch marks from last night are still fresh.
I bite down hard on his lobe and Nolan presses closer until I can feel his cock growing warm and heavy against my leg in the chlorinated water.
“Don’t call me by my full name,” Nolan whispers into my hair. I tug away from him, but he lifts a hand to the back of my head to hold me to him. “Don’t look at me right now.”
“Why?” I whisper back.
“That’s the name people use when they think I belong to them. Don’t call me that.”
“Is that why you reacted the way you did last night?”
Nolan shrugs enough for me to feel the uneasy movement. “I don’t know.”
