Calculation falls to the feeling of him saying my name like he wants me here.
Kael’s head tips back, wrecked, his glasses slightly crooked, and somehow still perfectly himself.
“You feel good,” he says, before one deep breath. “Really fucking good.”
That does more to me than any dirty line or joke could have. I kiss him and let my body take over. It’s been ready for this since before we stepped inside. The bed knocks softly against thewall. A jar rattles on the nearby rolling cart. Kael laughs into my mouth, breathless and bright, and I have no idea how laughter makes this hotter, but it does. Everything about him does.
His hand slides between us, and watching him touch himself while he takes me almost ends me on the spot. I lean closer to breathe him in, sweat and sauce and flour and paint, like the whole night has gathered on his skin.
I reach down to replace his hand, and his hips stutter up into mine.
“Fuck,” he says. “Okay. Yeah, but?—”
He comes hard over my fist, spilling across his chest with a broken sound that turns into laughter, like even he can’t believe how little it took. Before I can do anything but stare, he hooks both hands around my ass and pulls me deeper.
That finishes me. I come hard, barely managing to hold myself over him until my arms threaten to give out.
Kael kisses my jaw, soft enough to undo me all over again, and I flop to his side. We end up tangled together, breathing too hard, both of us inching closer instead of away.
Eventually he slides out of bed. “Stay there. I’m just going to clean up.” His cheeks go blotchy in the low light. “Also, you should stay the night. You don’t have to. I’m only saying it because it’s late and your clown car is probably legally classified as a scooter and?—”
I stand. “Oh, I’m staying the night. But there’s no way I’m letting you clean up in peace.”
CHAPTER 23
KAEL
Weeks bluras our lives transform in quiet, incriminating ways. Ash says he feels like he’s loosening up, but to me, being with him feels alarmingly close to sustainable, which is how I know it can’t last.
He leaves for Query at the same time every morning, protein shake in hand, running on some internal clock that makes me feel late to my own life. I pretend his routine is ridiculous instead of comforting. While he’s gone, I paint in the studio and keep my hands busy enough to stop checking my phone every five minutes. We text goofy memes and drive-by jokes throughout the day. I send him a photo of my canvas mid-mess, and he fires back a screenshot of some deranged color-coded spreadsheet. It doesn’t take long for that to stop being bleak and become something endearing. It’s who he is, and against all my better judgment, I like it.
I like him.
When I show him my studio, I expect a mix of kindness and funny barbs. Instead, he stands in front of a canvas and actually looks.
“I love how the background’s softer here,” he says, pointing near the horizon. “Like… the edges are blurrier? It makes thetree feel sharper. More of a focal point. And the contrast of light and shadows on this side…” He leans in, squinting, before looking back at me.
I stare at him. “When did you learn what chiaroscuro is?”
He flushes. “I may have… done some research. Don’t look at me like that.”
Somewhere between shocked and turned on, I push him back against the worktable and kiss him. It’s a lot of firsts in my sacred studio space, and I’m the one who started it.
Apparently, I want to start it everywhere. I get hard watching him crack jokes at dinner. My hand wanders when he’s driving us across the Golden Gate Bridge to some restaurant he wants me to try. I find myself wanting to kiss him before we part, even though that’s usually for only a few hours now.
At night, I keep finding new ways to break his smooth-talking act. He likes it when I lean in and murmur into his ear, then drag my mouth just beneath it until he makes that quiet gasp of a sound. He likes watching me reposition Rocky on the nightstand. We still haven’t saidI love you, which feels ridiculous to keep track of. But now that I know what he sounds like when he comes, I can’t shake the feeling that if we never say it, this will become just one more thing I enjoy now and pay for later.
The first time I see his apartment, another piece of the Ash puzzle I’m assembling clicks into place, and the image is nothing like the one I expected.
He’d built up the moment by dodging every question about his place until I asked Jenny what was up. She laughed and gave some vague warning that his life, until recently, had revolved solely around making money. I thought it was a sweet, friendly jab between best friends until he opened the door.
Takeout containers and discarded clothes litter the living room. A faint smell of old workout gear hangs in the air, and it’s far less appealing on forgotten gym shorts than on his skin.
“What?” Ash says, wincing. “Please say something. I told you it was bad!”
“I’m… I’m flabbergasted,” I manage through the hand covering my face, spotting board games, Tupperware, and books tucked into the wreckage.
“I’ll clean,” he says quickly. “Let’s go back to your place.”
