Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71212 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” I said, bending down to kiss his chest, his salty release still lingering on his skin.
“Says the Adonis,” Tristan replied, his hands tracing soft circles across my shoulders.
“Seriously,” I said, kissing up toward his neck. Salt and come mixed on my tongue. I ran my tongue across Tristan’s jaw, his stubble scratching me as he shivered underneath me.
That was all my spent body could muster before I collapsed next to him. He nestled into me like it was the most natural thing in the world. Just two men, floating together across space and time, creating their own little bubble of paradise, even if the sun was guaranteed to pop it when it rose in the morning.
As we lay there, wrapped up in each other, I knew that we had crossed a threshold, moving from friends to something deeper, something more profound. Our connection had only grown stronger, and it was time I stopped denying it.
Time to make it real. “Let’s be boyfriends,” I said, the words solidifying in the air before they had a chance to solidify in my brain.
A moment of dragged-out silence before Tristan spoke. “I was hoping that’s where this was leading.”
“You were?”
“Of course. I’ve told you before I never really had an actual relationship. I don’t think I ever found someone that really lit up that spark. But fucking hell, you lit that spark the second we met. I swear. It’s been so hard trying to fight it.”
I reached down and palmed him in my hand, grinning. “I can tell how hard it’s been.”
“Fucker,” Tristan said, leaning in and nipping on my bottom lip. My palm came back wet from his still-leaking cock. “What about the rules?”
“Screw the rules,” I answered. “They were all made up anyway. But I know you’re real. This is real. What I feel for you is real, Trist. And I’m ready to sink into it.”
He looked at me with those soft brown eyes that could melt an iceberg. “Me too,” he said, kissing me, climbing back on top of me, both of us getting hard again.
We went for another round, this one infinitely better than the last, if only because when I looked down, I wasn’t just looking into Tristan’s eyes; I was rocking my hips into my boyfriend, watching him writhe in pleasure as he begged for more.
And that’s exactly what I gave him.
21
TRISTAN HALL
The hotel room looked like a cyclone had escaped out of my luggage. Clothes hung half off the lip of the suitcase, as if it was regurgitating a pair of boxers and a couple of T-shirts. Jeans hung off the back of a chair, and a dirty pile of clothes was beginning to form on the desk. I stretched out on top of the bed, curling into a still-napping Gabriel, the afternoon sun sending a warm golden ray across my bare legs. Gabriel’s phone buzzed across the nightstand.
Life felt different in the days after the kidnapping.
Bottled water tasted like it came from a fresh Fiji spring (and I hated water). Television and social media took a very low spot on my list of priorities (and they used to be high as fuck). I was equal parts hungry enough to eat an entire buffet and also full enough to munch on popcorn for the rest of my life.
And the sex. The sex was out-of-this-fucking-world. The kind of sex that made your toes curl, eyes roll, and brain melt all before you even come. Maybe some of that had to do with the fact that it was Gabriel who was tossing and flipping me around on the bed like I was some kind of toy, but I think a lot of it came from being at one of my most extreme and frightening lows only to be thrown as close to the sun as possible, the heat working to burn away any fear and anxieties that were nipping at my heels.
And, oddly enough, the words were flowing better than ever. I had woken up early these last few days and gone down to the hotel cafe, which had a really nice view of the flower-filled courtyard. I sat at a table and started typing away. Plot holes that had been fighting me for months now seemed to sort themselves out. Character arcs were completed, and tensions were heightened.
At one point, I was chuckling to myself, thinking that maybe I needed to get kidnapped more often.
That thought quickly sent me on a small spiral and had me coming back up to the room, where I found Gabriel in bed, one leg out of the covers, his mouth slightly open, his chest slowly rising and falling. I didn’t care that I’d already had two cups of coffee. I stripped down to my boxers and climbed back into bed, curling into Gabriel’s solid form as we both drifted back off to sleep.