Page 46 of Meet Me in the Blue

“I’m okay,” he said.

“If you hate this, God if you do…” I sat up and brushed his cheek. “It’s alright… Rook, it’s—”

“I don’t hate this.” He kissed me, and I could taste myself on his tongue, and it was fucking perfect with inevitability, with us, and it was enough to wake me up, to let go of the last pieces of myself that I’d hidden away, that I’d protected just in case. In case he realized this wasn’t what he actually wanted. In case he realized I wasn’t for him. “Luka… I don’t hate this at all.” He drifted his thumb over my cheek, along my jaw, his mouth following along the same path. I whimpered as he sucked on my neck, biting my shoulder hard enough I was sure it would leave a bruise. “I want you.” He took my hand in his and lowered it to the rock-hard evidence of his desire. “This all feels so different from anything I’ve experienced. Being with you, it means more… you mean so much to me. I—”

He didn’t finish his sentence, pushing me down onto my back. I kicked my jeans off the rest of the way, while working his sweats over his hips. Once we were both naked, and skin to skin, I could breathe deeply again. Our bodies aligned, clicked into place, my hips fitting into his, his hands fitting my cheek, our mouths moving in sync, like a dance we’d somehow already known. My legs wrapped around him as we rutted together, seeking, needing. Rook held one of my hands above my head, threading his fingers through mine, and the quiet, cold night caught fire with the sound of our bodies, our moans as we lost ourselves in each other. My heels dug into the backs of his thighs, my free hand grasping the firm curve of his ass, needing him closer, harder. I rocked my hips, grinding into him. We were both slick and sticky with pre-come and sweat and I was losing my battle, the urgency of his thick cock sliding against mine, it was too much. I needed to come, I needed to scream, I needed to keep going and never stop.

“Luka,” he said my name in a hoarse whisper, his hips jerking once before his entire body went rigid.

His head dropped, his mouth open and panting above my lips as he came in hot bursts onto my stomach. My hand slipped from his grip above my head, falling to his hips as I teetered over the edge, writhing underneath him until I cried out his name too. The pressure of my climax washed over me, rooted me to this man above me, this man I’d always loved and thought I’d never have. I held onto him, my legs shaking, my eyes burning with humiliating tears. I blinked a few times but couldn’t stop the traitorous moisture from trickling down my cheeks.

“Luka… What’s wrong? Shit, did I do something you didn’t want?”

“No, God…” I shook my head, the absurdity of crying after sex made a strangled chuckle bubble up my throat. “I’m… Jesus. I don’t know why I’m crying.”

Rook kissed my tears, my lips, the heat of our orgasms quickly fading, drying on our skin. He rolled onto his side, and I moved onto mine, facing him. He picked up his t-shirt from somewhere and cleaned us both before tossing it back into the oblivion of the room. A place that didn’t exist to me beyond this bed, beyond him and me, and what we’d done.

Rook was all anxiety and concern as his serious, dark eyes assessed me. “You can cry. You just lost your dad.” He sighed, kissing my forehead and held my face in his hand. I leaned into the touch. “I shouldn’t have… we shouldn’t… Shit… I didn’t want you to regret it, but I understand if you—”

“Stop. I don’t regret a fucking second of what just happened.” I looked him in the eyes and covered his hand with mine. “Truthfully, I’d do it again, and again, until we couldn’t feel our lips if you were up for it, and not because I lost my dad, and I’m a fucking mess, and I’d rather get off than deal with it, but because I need my best friend. Because… I love you.”

“I love you, Luka. You know that.”

“I know.” I dropped my hand to his chest, trailing my fingers through the hints of hair there. “But it’s always been different for me, and maybe I got a little emotional because I can’t believe I get to have you like this.”

“I always thought I’d end up alone,” he said after a few tense seconds and scooped me into his arms. And like the needy guy I was, I snuggled deeper into his hold. “I’ve been confused for a long time.”

“Confused about your sexuality?”

“Yes, and how I never fit with anyone like other people do.” His fingers sketched the plunging line of my hip bone and the curve of every one of my ribs. “Nothing has ever come close to this, to tonight. Sex has always been an expected step, something that was unavoidable if I wanted to be romantically involved with someone. Sometimes it was okay, but I never had a chance to get to know the women I dated on the level I needed to let myself be vulnerable with them. And they’d get annoyed, or think I wasn’t attracted to them, and then it was over before I could get to know them well enough to really want sex. The closest I ever came to something real was with Elle, but we were too young.”

“And you never thought about dating men?” I asked, and he smiled, seeing through my passive-aggressive jealousy.

“There was this guy I thought was attractive in college. We got along pretty well, and he was into Magic, but he had a girlfriend. I think the attraction I had for him was just a reflection of how much I missed you. Missed what we had together.”

“I missed you every day I was gone.”

“Even when you had Graham?”

“I missed you more when I had him. He was never going to fill the void. And I feel like a dick for saying that because I did care about him.” Rook’s fingertips distracted me, tickling their way up my spine, leaving wakes of prickling goose bumps on my skin. “He wasn’t you,” I said and kissed the quiet dimple in his cheek.

“I’m nervous. What if I disappoint you?”

“No one is perfect, Rook. I know that.”

“But…” he hesitated, avoiding my eyes, every raw nerve we’d exposed tonight left uncovered and stinging between us. “It’s been difficult for me, in the past, and there’s no one I’d rather be with, but I can’t promise…” He exhaled, exasperated, and I rested my palm on the small of his back, and he relaxed under my touch. We were connected, his knee touching mine, his hand on my neck, our feet tangled. “I can’t promise sex will always be easy.”

“This wasn’t easy,” I said, and Rook held my gaze. “And it shouldn’t be. If I wanted it easy, I could have found some guy on Grindr. But I don’t want that anymore. I want to fall asleep like this. I want to stay wrapped up with you until you complain about it being too hot.” He laughed and I shrugged. “You’ve always hated getting overheated.”

“You’re oversimplifying.”

“I don’t have the mental capacity to under simplify.”

“I should let you sleep,” he said, and I tucked my head under his chin.

“Rook.”

“Yeah?”

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