Page 74 of Rock Bottom

My face flamed red hot, though I didn’t know why. Was that supposed to be a compliment, or did it mean I’d done something wrong?

Dante kissed me again before I could really consider it and moved his hips, slowly giving me more of him until he was all the way inside and I remembered how to breathe again. I put my arms around him, not in an embrace, but because I needed to hold on to something and he was all I had. For the first time in my life, I understood why people liked to be tied up during sex. I felt like I was going to fall or float away. It was almost like the dissociative states I experienced during a bad PTSD episode, except the crushing terror wasn’t there. In its place was something new and good. Something I needed more of.

“Are you okay?” Dante ran a thumb over my cheek.

I buried my face in the crook of his neck and nodded. “Don’t stop. I need this.”

“I know you do, but you also need me not to hurt you.”

“Don’t treat me like you’ll break me.” I gripped his biceps and squeezed. “I can handle anything except for that.”

Dante seized my lips in a kiss, the rough sandpaper feel of his cheek scraping against mine its own sort of ecstasy. He rolled his hips once, thrusting slow and deep and wrenching an involuntary sound from me. Every trace of the burning pain that’d been there before disappeared, leaving only pleasure behind.

This was what I was afraid of all this time, I thought in wonder as he set a rhythm. I’d been missing out on this. But maybe it wouldn’t be the same with someone else. I didn’t want it to be the same, because I didn’t want anyone else. There was something special about Dante, something that spoke to me in a way no one ever had before. I’d felt it even at the beginning. Back then, it had unnerved me, but now… Maybe we had only known each other a handful of days, but maybe that was long enough to know. Time wasn’t everything. My parents dated for five years before getting married and now they slept in separate wings of the house, married in name only.

He made me happy. Wasn’t that enough?

Dante built his pace faster, harder, until the sound of us coming together was a percussive beat that echoed off the rafters. I was sure Bowie was glad he’d turned on the music, but I barely heard it anymore. The only sounds that mattered to my ears were the ones Dante was making, the heavy breathing, the small grunts of pleasure, the rhythm of his body moving inside mine. My neglected cock throbbed against my stomach, and my knees ached from holding them up for so long, but I didn’t dare make a move to fix either problem. I didn’t want anything to change. If anything, I wanted that ache in my knees to be worse and the soreness in my hips to stay that way so that I could remember this was real.

“Fuck, you feel so good,” Dante whispered and shifted to put his arms under my legs to hold them up for me. He shifted inside of me too and when he drove himself into me the next time, he was hitting that spot inside me.

I groaned and let my head fall back. Dante spat in his hand and closed a fist around my aching cock. “Come for me, kitten,” he said and started pulling in time with his thrusts.

The words went straight from my ears to my balls. My cock thickened in his fist and I came hard with a shout, my hips jerking. Dante stroked me through it until it was too much and I had to push his hand away.

“Fuck.” He groaned and swiped his fingers through the mess on my stomach. “That’s so fucking hot.” He lifted his cum-coated fingers, slipping them between his lips with a groan.

Bloody hell…my idiot cock was already trying to rally for another round.

Dante let out another low, growling curse, and gripped my side tighter, fingernails digging in. His hips jerked twice, and he shuddered.

The look on his face as he came inside me was beautiful. No, more than that. There wasn’t a word for it, not in any language I knew, but I knew immediately that I wanted to see it again.

Dante pumped into me with a few more shallow thrusts before collapsing on top of me, head on my chest with a contented sigh. “Jesus Christ, that was the best fuck of my life, Church.” He lifted his head, sporting a big, dopey grin. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve thought he was drunk with the way he was slurring his words. “What’s the verdict with you? Worth it, right?”

“Worth it,” I agreed, and kissed him.

He pulled away and settled back in against my chest with another happy sigh. I put my arms around him and held him there, kissing the top of his head. I liked the way he smelled after sex, which was an odd thing to think about, but I did.

“How long do you think we have before Bowie loses his patience with us?” he mumbled.

I closed my eyes and listened. Music was still playing downstairs, but he’d moved onto music he actually liked, which was mostly contemporary country. “I’d say we have until the end of the next song.”

He shifted on top of me, lifting his head to give me a concerned look. “It’s not bothering you?”

“What?”

“The music.”

It took me a minute to realize what he was asking me. After I did, I checked in with myself, but none of the usual buzzing tension was there. “I guess not. Maybe I can handle it in small doses. If I’m distracted enough.”

“Hmm. Well, I’ll have to remember that.” He sat up and kissed my cheek. “I’ll be right back.”

Pure terror seized me as I realized the bathroom was downstairs—and that Bowie was also downstairs— and that might be where he was going, but he just went over by the window to toss the used rubber in the rubbish and grab some tissues. Dante came back and hopped onto the bed like a giant kid. A giant kid who’d brought tissues over to clean the cum off my belly.

“I can do that.” I reached for the tissues to finish the job.

Dante sighed and handed them over.

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