Page 104 of Arctic Titans of Northwood U: Volume 3

The only, I thought, then realized just how much that could make someone freak out if they heard it. “The first. It terrified me when I first realized it, but it was…God, it was beautiful. You were splayed on the ice like Toby, but on your back, and it wasn’t an accident—you were just being an ass and dragging out the drills because we were doing simple switching, and it bored you. You were always in a higher league than the rest of us. Old Coach Frank had that annoying habit of calling us men, even though we were thirteen, and he kept yelling at us all, ‘Pull yourselves together, men. We don’t have all day.’ But you just laughed, and I had to come over and drag you by the leg. But your dimples were so big, and dragging you only made you laugh louder. And I just…” I shrugged again. “Something cracked inside me, and I knew. I knew everything that had seemed so confusing for so long. All the other boys were starting to lie and brag about the things they saw or did, but it just seemed rude to me. Everyone seemed so desperate to practice kissing, but I thought it was distasteful. Until then. Then, when it hit me, all I could think about was kissing you. All I could think about was holding your hand, telling you I liked you, seeing movies with you and secretly making out in the back of the theater.” I’d never uttered these words aloud.

“I had no idea,” Griffin said, almost like it was an apology.

“I made sure you never knew,” I said, dispelling any notion of guilt. “That was the most important thing. That you never found out.”

“God, Andrei, I wish I felt this way sooner,” he said.

I put a hand on his chest and pressed him hard. “I don’t. It would have broken. We both learned lessons in this time, Griff. You needed to date a lot of people, and I needed to be patient.”

“And if I hadn’t figured it out?” he asked.

“I would have waited,” I said. “And hooked up from time to time.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’d basically cheat on me.”

I twisted his nipple as my fingers came to it. “While you were happily married?”

“I’d never have been happily married,” he said. “It would be a marriage of convenience. I’d fuel my hockey stardom with my unexplored frustrations, while my wife explored her range of sexuality with the maid. But you,” he said, mock outraged. “You’d know what you want. You’d be committed to me, and you’d still go off and do it with a stranger.”

I couldn’t stop the bubbling laughter that swelled to the surface. “Let’s fight about it.”

“I’ll wrestle you,” he said, then tossed the chocolate over to the other bed and climbed on top of me, grabbing my wrists and pinning them to my sides. “You lose.”

But I didn’t lose. Not the way I saw it. He leaned down and pressed his chocolaty lips against mine, kissing me deeply and sensually until I moaned right into his mouth. It wasn’t fair that I was in my boxer briefs and he still wore those annoying sweatpants. “Take them off,” I said against his lips. “I want to feel you.”

His smile spread against my lips, and he hesitated, then let me go and got up to take his sweatpants off.

Watching the waistband slide slowly down his legs made my heart beat a little faster. It always did. The light of the lamp bathed him in amber and aged gold while he slid his sweatpants down his muscular legs.

He pulled each foot out and knelt on the side of the bed with one knee.

My hand rested on my stomach as I lost myself in the moment. He picked up my hand, lifted it to his lips, and pressed a warm kiss against the back of it, then turned it and kissed my palm.

It was all out. Most of it, at least. Most of the things that had lived in the space between us, unspoken of and unacknowledged.

Griffin’s curly locks fell over his brow as he leaned down to kiss me, his lips heating up mine. It was like a kiss of life the prince bestowed upon Snow White’s lips. It was the breath I had lost, the heartbeat that had stopped, the chance where there had been only ashes of unfulfilled hopes and dreams.

Every time he kissed me felt this way. Every time was a new ripple of impossible things taking place across the galaxies.

Griffin’s tongue ventured into my mouth, meeting the tip of mine as I parted my lips for him.

He tasted like chocolate and pure lust. There was something so daring about Griffin, especially when he kissed me, and it filled me with wild desire for more.

I threw my arms around him and pulled him in, losing my breath as he crashed on top of me, both of us sinking into the mattress. He rubbed himself against me, hard dick thrusting against my thigh, and I held on to him, not letting any space invade the perfect unity between us.

“How are you this sexy?” he asked.

I didn’t know what to reply. There was no secret to it. I was myself at long last, and the real me was someone who belonged to Griffin. Perhaps that was what made me sexy in his eyes. Perhaps this willingness to be his everything, to split myself into shards and fly where the winds and currents of Griffin’s immense personality took me.

I pulled him closer instead of searching for the right words. I was beyond words. I lived for sensations in this moment, for the mix of scents, the symphony of touches, the naughty sounds, and the images playing out before my eyes that begged to be captured yet never truly could be.

I moaned as his weight descended on me again, his dick pressing against mine, and my hands slipped down to his ass, sliding under his underwear to feel the tender skin and the narrow space between his cheeks. He welcomed it, though the first time had made him tense up in anticipation. I had expected that it might, so I’d given him a moment to process it. To process the pleasure that came from the surprising sensation of my finger moving over his hole or reaching down to his taint from behind.

Griffin kissed the length of my neck, and I craned my head away, holding my breath and trying not to rupture.

When his hand reached down to my waist, holding me like I was his little toy, it made me shiver all over. I was whatever he wanted me to be.

My legs parted around his, and I yanked him harder into me, holding his ass in my hands and squeezing his cheeks in reply to the kisses on my neck that grew more heated with each passing moment. He kissed the tender space under my ear, sending ripples of short breaths and moans out of me.