Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
When right now there was something more in the silence, in the slow steady rhythm of their movements together, in Rian’s gasps of pleasure echoed in tandem with Damon’s as they met and came apart and met again, pushing and pulling each other until they gave and took with every delicious rush of friction that their bodies made together; every tight lock of flesh as Damon sank in deep and gave Rian all of him until he could barely take any more.
He could have stayed like this for hours, for days, for an endless eternity of breathing in Damon’s kisses and breathing out his pleasure...but Rian’s body wasn’t strong enough. Rian wasn’t strong enough, when he felt like this intense thing storming inside him was battering him to pieces, tearing him apart in silent ravages, and he held fast to Damon to keep himself together, to try to hold on even as Damon teased him toward breaking with rough fingers that found Rian’s cock and stole in lazy, teasing strokes along his length. Rhythm and counter-rhythm, fingers slicking over him, Damon’s cock sinking inside him, Damon’s tongue electrifying his mouth and capturing Rian’s every moan until they no longer belonged to him.
Nothing belonged to him anymore, not his will, not his body, not his self-control, and he lost that control as Damon jolted his hips just a little harder, crashed into Rian just right, and he felt that throbbing, that swelling as Damon arched his back and went stiff and caught a growl in his throat...
While Rian collapsed, inside and out.
He collapsed, his foundations crumbling out from under him to leave him helpless to the force of pleasure that crashed over him so violently it hurt, a rough ripping sensation seeming to drag his climax from him until he thrashed against Damon and it was only that heavy weight keeping him still, keeping him close, keeping him safe.
And holding him together, as Rian came down from something so dizzying and crushing he could hardly catch his breath, clinging to Damon as he tried to pull himself together.
Tried to pull himself together, and tried to figure out what had just wrenched inside him until suddenly the map of himself pointed in wholly new directions, and he no longer knew which way to turn to find journey’s end, only that the path was marked with breadcrumbs made out of the pieces of a heart that felt as if it could only be breaking. Especially when night was sinking, for him, as his eyelids fell, leaden in an instant as the last of his energy bled out.
“Rian...?”
He barely heard his name in a hoarse rasp, barely managed to whisper back something that felt far too honest, to kiss Damon when he couldn’t find better words, before he went under.
But Rian thought, even as he sank into the dark, even as he lost himself in the aftermath of a shattering that felt as if it had smashed him apart and remade him anew from the pieces...
He had made a mistake.
And in a moment of needy impulse, he had started something that could, in the end, only hurt them both.
* * *
Damon didn’t know why he was surprised Rian slept like the dead.
His heart had nearly stopped, when he’d gently pried their bodies apart and touched his fingers to Rian’s cheek...and realized he was crying. Tears streaking down his face in wet glimmers, and Damon had felt like a complete and utter shithead, panic rising inside him...only for Rian to smile at him, sweet and sad, and kiss him—lingering, warm, his palm cupping to Damon’s cheek.
It’s okay, he’d whispered against Damon’s lips. I’m okay. Thank you.
Before Rian had been gone almost in an instant, snuggled trustingly into Damon’s chest and caged between Damon’s body and the wall, when it was pretty much the only way they could both fit on the narrow twin bed without one of them falling off in their sleep. And as his breaths had evened out and calmed, Rian had turned still and quiet, loose and lax against Damon, his hair a leviathan ensnaring Damon’s limbs and keeping him close.
Not that Damon would have gotten up if he could; he was still caught, wrapped up in that moment when a slow, soft, hurting kiss had turned into something more. More than comfort; more than a distraction; more than...anything Damon had ever felt with every man he’d dated or casual fuck he’d thrown himself into to let off steam for a night.
That sense of isolation had always been there, even when he told himself he was trying to fall in love or even just trip over a little lust for a night or two. That sense of being separate, of not belonging, but it was always his walls they murmured about when they regretfully shook their heads and said this wasn’t going to work.