He looked over at me, flashing me a big smile. “I started letting myself have whatever I wanted here. And after a while, the person I used to be slowly came back.”
“Whatever you wanted, huh?”
“Yeah,” he said, sliding closer. “And if you’re interested, I wouldn’t mind helping you relax a little bit, handsome.” He reached out a hand, stopping just before it touched my shoulder. “Would you like that?”
I looked at his hand hovering near my shoulder, at the question in his eyes, at the way the warm light played across the water between us. My heart was doing something complicated in my chest. It wasn’t panic, exactly, but a kind of acceleration I hadn't felt in so long I'd almost forgotten what it was.
"I—" I started, then stopped. The truth was, I didn't know what I wanted. Or rather, I knew what I wanted but I couldn'tseem to access the part of myself that was supposed to know how to ask for it.
Erik's hand stayed where it was, patient. "We can start simple," he said quietly. "Just touching. See how that feels."
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
His hand settled on my shoulder, warm and solid. It was just that, his palm against my skin, his thumb moving in a small circle near my collarbone. It was nothing, really. The kind of casual contact that happened all the time in the world outside. But I felt it everywhere. In my chest, in my stomach, in places that had been quiet for so long I'd assumed they were permanently offline.
"Good?" he asked.
"Good," I managed.
His hand moved, sliding down my arm to rest on my forearm. Then back up, tracing the line of my shoulder blade. Simple touches, the kind meant to soothe rather than arouse, but my body was responding like he was doing something far more intimate. I could feel my cock getting hard under the water, which should have been embarrassing but somehow, here in this place, it wasn't.
"You're wound up pretty tight," Erik observed, his fingers finding a knot of tension at the base of my neck.
"Occupational hazard."
"What do you do?"
"I'm a lawyer,” I said before I remembered that people didn’t exchange that kind of info in the bathhouse. “And not the Law and Order kind."
He winced in sympathy. "Yeah, that'll do it." His hands moved to my shoulders, working at the muscles there with practiced ease. "You hold all your stress right here, don't you?"
I closed my eyes and let myself lean into the pressure of his hands. "I hold all my stress everywhere."
"When's the last time someone gave you a massage?”
The question surprised me. Was a massage a normal thing to get? The last time was with Adrián, probably. Two years ago. Some last ditch attempt to get me to respond to him that I’m sure I ignored.
"It's been a while," I said.
Erik made a soft sound, something between sympathy and disapproval. His hands stilled on my shoulders. "Can I ask you something?"
"What would you want right now if you could have anything? Not what you think you should want, not what makes sense. Just what you actually want."
I opened my eyes and looked at him. He was closer now, close enough that I could see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes, close enough to smell something that might have been cedar or sandalwood on his skin. Close enough that if I leaned forward just a few inches, I could kiss him.
And that's when I realized what I wanted.
"I want to remember what it feels like," I said.
Erik smiled, and I realized he knew exactly what I meant without my having to explain. "I can help you with that, I think."
He leaned in slowly, giving me plenty of time to pull away, and kissed me. It was soft at first, exploratory, his lips moving against mine with gentle pressure. But when I kissed him back, because I couldn’t help it, he deepened the kiss, his hand coming up to cup the back of my neck.
I heard myself make a sound, something embarrassingly needy, and Erik pulled back just enough to look at me.
"Still good?" he asked.
I nodded. "Still good."
