“Completely,” I say. “Absolutely certifiable. I’m standing in your rehab room with a big boner and no shame. No shame at all, Mickey. I don’t care.”
His thumb moves against my hip. Through my shirt. One stroke, slow, maybe an inch of movement, and the heat of it runs down my leg.
I trail my hand down his forearm. “Am I allowed to touch you?” I ask.
His thumb stops. “You are touching me.”
“I’m touching your arm. I’ve touched your arm before. Can I touch something new? Can I touch your chest? I’ve been staring at it for five minutes, and I’m losing my mind. If I don’t put my hands on it, I’m going to think about it for the rest of my life. I need you to give me permission because I’m about two seconds from laying my hands on you anyway, and I’m trying to be a gentleman even though I might be past that point already.”
He looks up at me, his eyes dark and his mouth slightly parted. His arm is still anchored around me, and neither of us is pretending this is a game anymore.
“Yeah,” he says. “You can touch me.”
I lean over slightly and put my right hand flat against his chest. The skin is warmer than I expected, sun-heated, the muscle underneath firm and thick. His pec fills my hand. I spread my fingers and feel his heart beating under my palm, faster than his face is letting on.
“Very nice,” I say, still smiling. “I like it. In fact, I like it a lot. I’ve never dated muscular men. I could definitely get used to this.”
He doesn’t move and is watching my face carefully.
I slide my hand up to his shoulder. The muscle is round and solid under my fingers. I squeeze gently, and his eyes close.
“Your body feels incredible,” I say. “You need to know that. Whatever you’ve been telling yourself at night about what the bullet took from you, it didn’t take this. This body is… fuck,Mickey, you feel so good under my hand right now that I can barely breathe. I’ve wanted to touch you this way forever.”
His jaw flexes and he swallows hard. He pulls me a fraction closer. My hand slides from his shoulder down to his collarbone and rests there in the hollow where I can feel his pulse hammering against my fingertips.
“Your heart is racing,” I say.
“No kidding.”
My other hand moves, sliding to the back of his neck, into his hair. It’s softer than I imagined, thicker. My fingers curl, my nails grazing his scalp, and the sound he makes surprises me. Low. Rough. Pulled straight out of him like he didn’t even know it was there.
I freeze for half a second, stunned at what my touch did to him.
“Mickey,” I whisper.
He opens his eyes and looks at me. Neither of us seems capable of pulling away.
“Benji.” His voice is raw. “If you don’t stop touching me like that, I’m going to do something I can’t take back.”
My fingers slow in his hair, but I don’t pull away. I’m trying to read if he means stop or if he means don’t you dare stop.
“Would not taking it back be so bad?” I ask.
“No. But I want to do it right. Not here when someone can walk in on us. And not with a clock on it.”
I nod, even though every part of me hates it. My hand slips from his hair to his jaw, my thumb brushing along his cheekbone. I drag my hand down his chest one more time, feeling every inch of him, the hard plane of muscle on either side. I let my fingers trail down to his stomach where the skin gets softer and the blonde hair starts. I stop there because I don’t know if he’d want me to go any lower.
“Your happy trail is making me want to do things I shouldn’t,” I say. “I can’t stop staring at it. Your happy trail should be illegal.”
I reluctantly lift my hand off his stomach. I want to keep going, to slide lower, to find out what his skin feels like under my fingers where the hair thickens and the waistband starts. But I stop. He’s gone through enough, and the last thing I want to do is put pressure on him.
“I don’t want to stop,” I tell him. “I need you to know that. I’m not stopping because I don’t want this. I’m stopping because I want it so much, but I need you to be the one who decides when.”
His eyes are dark and open, and I can see the war behind them.
“Benji,” he says. “You’re not pressuring me. This is the best I’ve felt in my own skin since the bullet. Your hands did that.” He swallows. “I’m just not physically ready for where this goes next. And I hate that. I hate it so much that I’m not ready. My mind and upper body are ready and willing. The rest of me is not. Not yet.”
“Then we wait until you’re ready,” I say. “And if that’s next week or next month or never, I’ll still be here with creamand my hands will go exactly where you tell them to go and nowhere else. You’re in charge of this. You hear me? Not me. You.”
